Georgia's outgoing defense minister said Monday that he had quit the country as speculation simmered of potential prosecutions of former officials under the ex-Soviet state's new government.

"I have taken the decision to leave Georgia with the hope that I will come back and will have the possibility to serve my country and my people again," Dimitri Shashkin said on his Facebook page.

Shashkin was defense minister before the October 1 polls that saw President Mikheil Saakashvili's ruling party defeated by a coalition led by billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili.

He formally remains acting minister until a new cabinet is confirmed on Thursday.

Shashkin said he had "absolutely differing values" from Ivanishvili's coalition and warned people not to give credit to any "unbelievable stories" that might emerge about him in the near future.

One of Ivanishvili's top allies said Monday that there would be no "political persecution" of former officials but those who had broken the law would not escape justice.

"I understand those people who committed crimes and know it. This is why they are fleeing and looking for asylum," Sozar Subari, who is set to become prisons minister in the new government, told journalists.