Last month's failed mutiny at a tank base near Tbilisi was financed by a wealthy St. Petersburg banker with ties to Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, a senior Georgian lawmaker said.

The banker, Alexander Ebralidze, owner of Konstans Bank with an estimated fortune of at least $250 million, told The Moscow Times that he was not behind the mutiny and did not know Putin personally. But he said he was "absolutely certain" that he would become Georgia's next president.

The allegations add a new twist to bad relations between Tbilisi and Moscow, which sank to new lows after Georgia suffered a humiliating defeat at the hands of Russian forces in its attempt to forcibly retake its separatist region of South Ossetia last August.

Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili has accused Russia of seeking to orchestrate his ouster, including with the failed May 5 mutiny at the Mukhrovani military base.

Russian officials have called his allegations "insane," although Putin has made no secret of his contempt for Saakashvili, telling French President Nicolas Sarkozy during the South Ossetia conflict that he wanted to "hang Saakashvili by the balls."

Givi Targamadze, chairman of the security and defense committee in Georgia's parliament, said he had evidence that the failed mutiny was sponsored by Ebralidze, an ethnic Georgian who holds a Russian passport, and suggested that Ebralidze had acted with Putin's blessing.

"I wouldn't name this person, but he announced after the mutiny that he could no longer wait and would run for president in the next elections. This person is Mr. Ebralidze," Targamadze said in comments aired on Georgia's Rustavi-2 television late last week.

Targamadze added, "If anyone thinks that in today's Russia it is possible to be an oligarch from St. Petersburg and not be controlled by the most famous St. Petersburg native of all, Putin, he is wrong."

Targamadze accused Ebralidze of financing the mutiny to "at minimum cause riots and at maximum to prepare the base for the entry of Russian occupation forces into Tbilisi."

The bloodless mutiny, which involved a 300-member tank battalion and ended with the unit's peaceful surrender after several hours, occurred a day before the start of month-long NATO exercises in Georgia. Russia opposed the war games as "muscle flexing."

Ebralidze, 54, who was born in Batumi, Georgia, and has lived in Russia since 1971, announced his presidential bid on May 15 at a Sochi meeting of the World Congress of the Nations of Georgia, an organization that he heads.

"I have been waiting for 20 years, but now I am giving up my modesty," Ebralidze told the congress, prompting the Georgian delegation attending the event to immediately walk out in protest.

Ebralidze, who does not have a Georgian passport, said at the meeting that he would come to Tbilisi in June to claim Georgian citizenship and to open a branch of his organization in Georgia. He said he planned to run in 2013, when Saakashvili's term expires.

In addition to owning Konstans Bank, Ebralidze is the founder and CEO of Taleon Group, which owns a hotel, a casino and a restaurant in St. Petersburg. One of Taleon's directors is Arkady Rotenberg, Putin's former judo teacher, Vedomosti reported.

Various sources estimate Ebralidze's net worth to be anywhere from $250 million to $500 million. He served two prison sentences in Soviet times on charges of armed assault and hooliganism.

Ebralidze told The Moscow Times that he was not involved with the mutiny and said he had lodged a complaint against Targamadze with the Prosecutor General's Office in Tbilisi.

"We will wait for a response and then take the next step," Ebralidze said in e-mailed comments. "I think this citizen will have to explain himself in court."

He said "unfortunately," he did not know Putin personally.

Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, said he was unaware of Putin being personally acquainted with Ebralidze.

"Sadly, we hear all kinds of wild claims out of Tbilisi that are too absurd to comment on," he said.

Ebralidze said patriotic pride toward both Georgia and Russia had led him to seek Georgia's presidency. "I love my motherland, Georgia. The presidency provides a way to solve the problems of Georgia's territorial integrity and a way to foster good ties with my second motherland, Russia," he said. "I am absolutely certain of victory."

Ebralidze said as president, he would promote a policy of neutrality for Georgia, and the country would have "equally friendly" relations with Russia, the U.S. and the European Union.

Georgian politicians and analysts downplayed Ebralidze's importance while emphasizing that anything was possible in the world of Georgian politics.

"He's an inflated figure," said Dato Zurabishvili, of the opposition Republican Party. "He has no authority in Georgia."

He also cast doubt on Ebralidze's possible involvement in the mutiny. "They [the government] talk plenty of nonsense," he said. "They think that just because they say something, people will believe it."

Ebralidze is still "a new thing for Georgia," said Alexander Rondeli, president of the Georgian Foundation for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank. "He is quite unknown here.

"Will people vote for him? In Georgia, you can find people willing to vote for a crocodile," he said. "But whether he would get any significant amount of votes still remains to be seen."