The company “Solidus” imported fuel into occupied Abkhazia. The company’s owner, Giorgi Arveladze, confirmed the information to “Radio Liberty.”
Arveladze said the shipment involved approximately 300 tons of fuel, not 3,000, which his company supplied to its “Abkhaz partners” via the Enguri Bridge.
Arveladze says his company has had “special enterprise status” for years:
“Until now, we had been supplying agricultural and food products. This is the first time fuel has been supplied. I work together with Abkhaz partners. This is a bridge between Georgian and Abkhaz businesses,” the businessman said.
Arveladze said the fuel is intended “mainly for the population of Gali and for local gas stations.”
“If we had not brought it in, 40,000 Georgians would have started coming to Zugdidi with 20-liter canisters. That is why it was decided that it would be better for me to bring it in together with my Abkhaz friends,” he added.
Asked whether another shipment of gasoline is planned to be sent to Abkhazia, Arveladze responded:
“I wish it were always like this and that there were always Georgian petroleum products in Abkhazia. This is the first transaction in 33 years.”
Arveladze also explained that his company purchases the fuel on the Georgian market. The gasoline brought into Abkhazia entered Georgia from Europe.
Information was disseminated in the media that, against the background of the fuel crisis created in Abkhazia, fuel entered from territory controlled by Georgia. At a briefing held in the Government Administration on 12 August, the head of government Irakli Kobakhidze confirmed the said information and stated that the fuel was brought in not by the authorities, but by business in compliance with the law.
The Georgian government has not issued a special legal act authorizing the supply of fuel to occupied Abkhazia. The government administration told Radio Liberty that there was no need to issue such a legal act because the gasoline was brought into Abkhazia by a company with “special enterprise status.”
On August 11, 2026, the government issued a new decree extending LLC “Solidus’s” authorization to operate in the occupied territory for three months, “for relations arising from July 18, 2026.”
On April 5, 2019, then-Prime Minister Mamuka Bakhtadze approved the “Procedure for Granting Special Enterprise Status to a Person” based on Georgia’s Law on Occupied Territories. Under the document, the Revenue Service grants a company such status. The document allows a company with “special enterprise status” to bring goods into the occupied territories.
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