CIU Letter to Paata Salia, Director General of TV Company Rustavi 2

To Director General of TV Company Rustavi 2

Paata Salia

Dear Mr. Salia,

We would like to inform you that on December 22, 2018 TV Company Rustavi 2 prepared a video report on Caucasus International University based on the information of an anonymous applicant and false accusation which has seriously damaged the reputation of the university. Two facts have been discussed in the video report: issuing a so-called false diploma to one of our students and studying and assessment part of one of our doctoral students, Tea Tsulukiani.

We would like to briefly explain the details of the deliberate allegations of your television journalists Eco Maghradze and the Saturday Courier Group:

Azerbaijani citizen, Mirjalal Zeinalov really studied at our university, he was admitted at postgraduate program in 2014 and graduated in 2017. He submitted a document verifying the change of surname issued by the Ministry of Justice of Azerbaijan prior to issuing diploma. He submitted an application to issue a diploma on a new, changed surname and we approved it. The amendment has been made in the Students Registry of the Ministry of Education and Sciences. It was easy to check the above mentioned information by the journalists of your university, however they have not done so. Not to mention the invasion of the university by them, without prior agreement, violence, aggressive tone and scandalous statements.

As for the Minister of Justice, Tea Tsulukiani’s issue who is a student of Doctoral Program in Law at our university, she was enrolled in the program in September, 2017 and professor Mindia Ugrekhelidze has been approved as her scientific supervisor. There exist all the necessary documentations on studying and research components implemented by the doctoral student. Her prospectus was successfully defended. According to the data available to the journalist (the correspondent had a doctoral student’s card) it was clear that when the student did not / could not attend the meetings envisaged with the study components, she did not have any assessments. Consequently, it was predetermined to discredit the Minister, which in itself undermined our reputation. As mentioned above, the video report has significantly damaged the image of the university.

We had to consider which way would be more pragmatic and civil to rehabilitate a discredited name. We have decided not to follow a political agenda and began to build sound arguments in a legal way. For this reason, on December 24, we addressed the Minister of Education, Science, Culture and Sport of Georgia and the Director of the LEPL National Center for Educational Quality Enhancement to study the issue and respond accordingly. The Ministry of Education, for its part, sent a letter to General Prosecutor's Office of Georgia, as the case contained information about a possible fact of criminal offense.

Within the framework of the Ministry's response, a monitoring team was established by the LEPL National Center for Educational Quality Enhancement, they visited the university and studied the issue. Monitoring Committee prepared a report and none of the violations reported by your TV company has been confirmed. Eventually, the case was reviewed by the authorization board of the National Center for Educational Quality Enhancement, they also investigated the circumstances and suspended proceedings for revoking university authorization.

Simultaneously, the prosecutor's office was conducting an investigation. They demanded from the university all the documents available from the moment of the enrollment of Mirjalal Kangarli, during his studies and after graduation. In addition, the data of crossing the border by the graduate have been checked, his lecturers have been interviewed and finally it has been determined that there was no criminal law action and the investigation was terminated.

For seven months, the university quietly, without any further statements, tried to investigate the case in the most comprehensive way and with high standards. The letter of 13 July 2019 on the termination of the criminal procedure was the final document authorizing us to legally seek the rehabilitation of the abusive name and dignity. Accordingly, we are requesting TV Company Rustavi 2 to deny all the allegations made in a video report on December 22, 2018 towards Caucasus International University either in the same program or simply make a public statement (Appendix 1 the Resolution on Termination of Investigation in Criminal Procedure – five pages is enclosed to the statement and appendix 2 - Decision of the Authorization Board of Higher Education Institution and the Report of the Authorization Expert Group - Twelve pages).

We do hope that under the new leadership of Rustavi 2, such incidents will no longer take place and Caucasus International University will not be the victim of false accusations and dirty political games.

Yours sincerely,

Kakhaber Kordzaia

Caucasus International University Rector

Resolution on Termination of Investigation in Criminal Procedure

Decision of the Authorization Board of Higher Education Institution and the Report of the Authorization Expert Group