Georgia’s Interior Ministry has renewed its search for Guram Dadianidze, a teenager who disappeared in the village of Kvemo Mleta in Dusheti in 2014. The case was reopened after a video shot around the same time as Dadianidze’s disappearance resurfaced on Georgian social media. The teenager’s mother says she could hear her son’s voice in the video.

Late on Monday, ministry employees began re-examining the area where Dadianidze was last seen. His mother, Sopho Bibilashvili, was also present at the site.

According to the ministry, around 50 employees were involved in Monday’s search and will use ‘appropriate technical equipment and special means’ to examine the area.

The renewed search comes after renewed public attention to the case following interviews given by Bibilashvili to the Your Story (‘Sheni Ambavi’) YouTube channel in July.

‘A scanner will be placed in every place. So the search will continue until this place is explored, and during this time I will be here. Thank you to everyone,’ Bibilashvili wrote on social media on Monday.

Dadianidze was 17 when he disappeared on 11 June 2014 while returning from an excursion to the Lomisa shrine in the Mleta area.

On 7 August, a 12-year-old video from YouTube began circulating on social media in which a voice can be heard saying, ‘Don’t leave me, I’m begging you’. Bibilashvili believes the voice in the video belongs to her son.

The Interior Ministry said on Monday that police had interviewed the person who filmed and uploaded the video. According to the ministry, the interview established that the video was filmed at around 15:00 on 11 June 2014. The ministry did not share any additional details about its interview with the person who shot the video.

The ministry added that this was several hours after Dadianidze was reported missing.

According to the ministry, 16 people from the Temka settlement travelled by minibus to the Lomisa shrine on 10 June 2014. They were unable to reach the shrine by vehicle because of the difficult terrain and continued on foot from Mleta.

The group left the shrine at around 02:00 on 11 June.

According to witness statements cited by the ministry, Dadianidze was walking with a relative and two neighbours, a father and son. At one point, he sat down on a rock to rest, which the three witnesses reportedly saw.

The ministry said the group was between 300 and 500 metres from the vehicle at the time. Dadianidze then asked the others to continue towards the car and said he would catch up with them.

The three people accompanying him continued walking, according to the ministry, because they were close to the vehicle and believed there was no danger in leaving him there.

After they had walked a short distance and noticed that Dadianidze had not caught up, one of the neighbours began searching for him with a torch. When he returned to the place where Dadianidze had last been seen, he was no longer there.

Police were notified and joined the search.

The ministry said Dadianidze did not have a phone with him, making it impossible to establish his subsequent movements through mobile phone data.

It also said witnesses had reported no conflict involving Dadianidze during the trip or at the shrine, and that there had been no apparent tensions. According to the ministry, many pilgrims were also in the area where Dadianidze was last seen.

The ministry said all those who had travelled with Dadianidze had been questioned and that all necessary investigative measures had been carried out. It said no suspicious circumstances or evidence of violence had been identified.

Bibilashvili has called for the area near where her son disappeared to be excavated and examined using specialised equipment.

She has argued that a landslide occurred in the area in 2014 and that the search should take this into account.

Zurab Burduli, a former municipal official in Dusheti, disputes this account. Burduli was present in the area when Dadianidze disappeared and says the section affected by the landslide was located further away from where the teenager was last seen.

The ministry also rejected claims that no investigative or search measures were taken between 2014 and 2017.

According to the ministry, a search case was opened at the Dusheti District Police Department in 2014 and ‘all necessary search measures’ were carried out to establish Dadianidze’s whereabouts.

The investigation into his disappearance remains ongoing. The ministry said more than 20 people had been questioned over July and August.

It called on those involved in discussing the case not to ‘mislead the public’ or spread false or unverified information.