The legal advisers of the former prime minister of Georgia, Bidzina Ivanishvili, are disseminating information regarding the ongoing dispute with Credit Suisse.

According to the legal advisers of the former prime minister, the relationship with Credit Suisse went beyond the legal scope and became political. According to them, this happened after the war in Ukraine started at the end of February 2022, and since March, Ivanishvili has had problems with receiving personal funds, as well as receiving works of art and aircraft.

"Ivanishvili's legal advisors, in accordance with the instructions of our own attorney, always promised the public that we would keep them informed about the ongoing dispute between Ivanishvili and Credit Suisse. We have never deviated from this promise, however, it is worth noting that it has been about 3 months since the last information on this matter was announced. Here we must explain to the public that the reason for our refraining from disseminating information was an attempt on the part of Credit Suisse to negotiate (or, as seen from today's perspective, to simulate negotiations). Within the framework of this process, we considered it better to refrain from negative reports about the opposing party and its actions, in parallel with the possible negotiation. This is the reason why we have not provided current information to the public in the last period.

However, it is now clear to us that the creation of the illusion of negotiation by the bank's management actually served the purpose of political pressure and not for anything else, not even to gain any benefit for the bank. Therefore, we have to return to the public information space and, among them, bring to the public the issues that we announced in the form of press conferences in the summer. This information will be made public both in Georgia, and we will also try to get it into the Western media. Of course, it will be possible to bring the issue to the international media, if this attempt does not share the same fate as in previous cases. We remind you that in the past, the international and Swiss media had no problem reporting the bank's violations, as well as the shortcomings of the Swiss court and justice system. However, when it came to our statements that the management of Credit Suisse was deliberately acting to damage the image of the bank, as well as the reputation of the Swiss state, and was involved in political pressure, the media space was immediately closed to us. If such blocking of information continues, it will allow us to draw separate, additional conclusions.

Now, as for the issue directly, we will try to explain it to the ordinary citizens of Georgia as clearly as possible, because, in general, the issue requires quite specific professional knowledge.

Those who followed the information provided by us will remember that the relationship with Credit Suisse went beyond the legal scope and became purely political. This happened after the military conflict started in Ukraine at the end of February 2022, and already in March, Ivanishvili faced problems both with receiving personal funds and receiving works of art and aircraft. Then, although with great effort, the issues were resolved in court. At the same time, this was only a small part of the list of problematic issues, because Ivanishvili had and has limited access to the main assets - funds. We call this event informal sanctioning. Here we are talking not about the amounts that are in dispute, but about the amounts that survived the theft and fraud in Credit Suisse. Here is this saved amount, the client transferred a part to another Swiss bank, and a small part, about 5%, remained in Credit Suisse only because it was a formal need to ensure the viability of the ongoing disputes.

The said assets were and are managed through two trusts. This is the financial structure that was recommended to Ivanishvili by Credit Suisse itself. One trust is located in Singapore and the other trust is under the jurisdiction of the Guernsey Islands (a British territory). It is the latter that manages the remaining principal funds of Credit Suisse. It became necessary to preserve the trust because it is a subject involved in the dispute with the bank. There is also the nuance that, in the absence of the bank's consent, the closing of the trusts requires a rather long court procedure (it should also be said that the bank had no right or reason to refuse to close the trust created for the benefit of the client). Accordingly, the amount was transferred to another bank, but the asset is still managed by the trusts, which means that access to the funds outside the trusts is impossible. The said trust is a Credit Suisse trust and, despite its connection with Credit Suisse, it has been performing its functions for quite some time without creating any obstacles for the client. This situation continued until March 2022, that is, before the start of the war in Ukraine. Since March 2022, the Credit Suisse trust, which could not be closed by the client for legal reasons, began to create serious obstacles for Ivanishvili, which in practice first manifested itself in a one-month delay in payments, and then in the complete blocking of access to the funds.

We would like to make a brief clarification here: although the lawsuits in Singapore and Bermuda are ongoing, the dispute in both jurisdictions is long-standing: the suit in Bermuda was filed in 2016, and the final determination of jurisdiction in Singapore took place in March 2020. Thus, the stage where the parties referred to new facts, evidence and claims was finally closed by November 2021. Accordingly, with the advice of his own lawyers, Ivanishvili was told that the problem of access to funds could no longer be brought to the attention of the courts in the format and scope of the ongoing disputes. Nevertheless, when in September 2022 a court hearing was held in Singapore, where Ivanishvili appeared as a witness, he skilfully took advantage of a question from the opposing side's lawyer and in his answer hinted to the court that Credit Suisse was behaving like a "gangster bank". Ivanishvili noted that the bank not only forces the client to go to a dispute in different jurisdictions for years, but also does not make the payments ordered by the Swiss prosecutor's office and the court even in 2019. Moreover, it completely restricts access to funds withdrawn from Credit Suisse, but remaining under the management of Credit Suisse trusts. Although it was not easy to bring the issue to the judge, because the issue was not directly related to the current dispute, however, it was finally possible to get the court's attention. As a result, the judge has already asked Credit Suisse the question of why non-disputed funds were not transferred to the client. It was this question that determined that Credit Suisse began to imitate the negotiation with Ivanishvili, and during this process they returned to the client a significant part of the amount that was still imposed by the Swiss court 3 years earlier. In December of this year, just a few days ago, Ivanishvili was paid the interest accrued due to late payment of the aforementioned amount. The bank also paid the amount that the Singapore trust of Credit Suisse did not account for. If Credit Suisse had not acted in this way, it would have had a severe negative impact on the judge's attitude towards the mentioned bank. Thus, the bank was forced to implement a certain maneuver that would be an imitation of an attempt to act in good faith. This is the process that caused the pause in the communication with the public, which we talked about in the beginning of this letter. On Friday, December 23, all illusions ended.

Here, the issue requires a slight digression: on December 14, 2022, the European Parliament adopted a resolution recommending the sanctions against Ivanishvili to the executive bodies of the European Union. Against this background, the bank made the last transfers to the client exactly after December 14. Why we highlighted this circumstance: We said that the trust on the island of Guernsey manages the largest part of Ivanishvili's Credit Suisse saved funds. These funds are now in another Swiss bank, but under the management of a Credit Suisse trust. Neither Credit Suisse as a bank nor its trust has and cannot have any financial interest in not following Ivanishvili's instructions with respect to the funds belonging to him. Accordingly, we termed these actions of the Guernsey trust as political blackmail, as it had been obstructing transfers since March initially under the pretext of "the geopolitical situation in Eastern Europe". In this regard, there was a long correspondence between the lawyers for several months. Meanwhile, Credit Suisse received the first resolution of the European Parliament on June 9, 2022, which called on the Council to sanction Ivanishvili. Credit Suisse saw a solution in this resolution, albeit with a delay, because already in July, when the European Council meeting was held and it did not reflect any sanctions against Ivanishvili, after that the Credit Suisse trust stated that due to the resolution of the European Parliament, it was deprived of the possibility to transfer funds to the beneficiary. Thus, the bank did not transfer the amount to the client based on the price-lost (non-shared) resolution and could not indicate the norm on the basis of which it did so. It told the beneficiary that it would transfer his undisputed amount only if the court ordered it, because otherwise it was allegedly limited by the resolution of the European Parliament. Accordingly, this time we had to file an application in the Guernsey court in order to return the client's undisputed funds, and the process there was not held at the promised time, in September 2022, but it was postponed several times (from September to November, from November to December, from December to January, etc.) After the postponement, it will take place in March 2023 (if this trend continues, March will probably be postponed as well). It is important to note that this is not even a lawsuit. It is a formal process where the parties do not dispute each other, but the court simply confirms a certain action. Such a process actually takes one day (and it is true, in March, there is a one-day process scheduled). Moreover, in the process of illusory negotiations, we proposed to a high-ranking representative of the bank to settle the issue of the money frozen by the Guernsey trust in a short time without court, but in vain. The main and unheard of absurdity here is that one trust of the bank has not paid the amount for months and makes us go to court for the undisputed amount, thanks to the June resolution of the European Parliament; And the second trust, where there was a small amount, makes the transfer on the second day after the December resolution, while this resolution of the European Parliament is new and, therefore, theoretically viable - it can even hypothetically be shared by the Council. This is the real "price" of the resolution of the European Parliament, and Credit Suisse knows this "price". It would be correct for the bank to act in the first case as well as in the second case. Under these conditions, it turned out that both resolutions could be ignored in order to avoid the negative impression of the Singapore judge, and only on the pretext of the June resolution, the bank requires us to go through long court procedures on the matter related to the Guernsey trust.

We want the public to know that we are in this absurd situation today: on the one hand, the bank management refuses to make a transfer from the funds managed by one of the trusts (where there is a large amount) and is taking us to court because of the resolution of the European Parliament, which was ignored by both the European Council and the European Commission, by which it is delaying the transfer by at least one year (from March 2022 to March 2023, even if the trial takes place in Guernsey in March);

And the funds managed by the second trust were transferred without any problems on the second day after the adoption of a stronger resolution of the European Parliament. By doing so, the bank's management showed itself how well-founded (more precisely, unfounded) their reference to the first resolution is. The latter transfer was made only by the management of the bank reporting to the principal judge in Singapore, as the judge clearly raised the question of unreasonably delayed payments, which the bank simply could not ignore, even if the European Parliament resolution was ignored. The latter was not a problem for the bank's management.

All this means and implies that political blackmail continues and, it seems, will continue in the future as well," says the information released by Ivanishvili's legal advisers.

source: IPN