Georgian mafia leader nabbed in Istanbul

ISTANBUL – Demirören News Agency

The leader of a crime syndicate and a citizen of Georgia, Guram Chikladze, who was expelled from Turkey this year, was nabbed in a luxury hotel in the Beşiktaş district of Istanbul on Oct. 27.

“It is understood that he had reentered the country with a fake passport in the name of Andri Malyi,” said the police sources.

Police raided the hotel room where Chikladze and his two guards were staying during the early wee hours at about 3 a.m. and detained all of them.

Also, three guns, loads of ammunition and three radio sets were seized in the raid.

“The trio were talking to each other with radio sets not to be caught in telephone tapping,” added the sources.

According to the police sources, the Georgian mafia leader was captured in an operation conducted on Jan. 31 in Istanbul after the police were informed that Chiklazde and his men were going to kill an Azeri mafia leader Nadir Salifov.

Guram Chikladze and his six men were earlier imprisoned for “forming a criminal organization” and “attempted murder.”

After some months in prison, Chikladze was deported at the beginning of the summer.

His foe, Salifov, was killed in the southern province of Antalya on Aug.19.