{"id":443316,"date":"2017-01-22T20:12:33","date_gmt":"2017-01-22T20:12:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.moldova.org\/en\/?p=443316"},"modified":"2017-01-22T20:12:33","modified_gmt":"2017-01-22T20:12:33","slug":"moldova-weekly-news-digest-22-january-2017","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.moldova.org\/en\/moldova-weekly-news-digest-22-january-2017\/","title":{"rendered":"Moldova Weekly News Digest, 22 January 2017"},"content":{"rendered":"Reading Time: <\/span> 8<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>

-On January 17th, the President of the Republic of Moldova, Igor Dodon, met<\/a> Russia President Vladimir Putin to discuss the Moldo-Russian relations. The Presidents reportedly talked on the Transnistrian conflict settlement,\u00a0returning the Moldovan goods on the Russian market,\u00a0<\/em>situation of Moldovan working migrants in Russia, economic and commercial cooperation, but also that in the humanitarian and cultural spheres.<\/p>\n

In a joint press conference with Putin, Dodon also declared that he would pledge to cancel the Association Agreement of Moldova with the European Union, if\u00a0his former Socialists\u2019 Party (PSRM) wins a majority at the next Parliament elections.<\/p>\n

\u201c<\/em>By the way, I was always against the signing of this Agreement. This document has brought nothing to the Republic of Moldova. We lost the Russian market. However strange, our exports to the European Union also decreased, so did not get anything from this agreement.<\/i><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t exclude that, after the next Parliamentary elections when I hope that PSRM will obtain a Parliamentary majority, this Agreement will be cancelled<\/i>\u201d<\/em>, declared Dodon at the joint press conference<\/a> with Putin.<\/p>\n\n

Igor Dodon\u2019s statement on the Association Agreement with the EU actually misinforms the public by presenting wrong information and there\u2019s proof<\/a> for that.<\/p>\n

-The Democrat oligarch Vlad Plahotniuc reacted<\/a> to the declaration of the Moldovan President Igor Dodon in Moscow on possibly cancelling the Association Agreement with the European Union. Plahotniuc stressed, in a Facebook post, that Moldova should not show contradictory signals of foreign policy since it has only the European external vector.<\/p>\n

Moldova’s prime minister, Pavel Filip on Wednesday reacted angrily to a suggestion by the nation’s president that the ex-Soviet republic may shelve a trade pact with the European Union. In a statement to The Associated Press<\/a>, Premier Pavel Filip said Moldova’s constitution did not allow the president “to announce or take such decisions,” which he called “pure, political rhetoric.”<\/p>\n

Filip said his pro-European government would “not accept any intervention,” from Dodon about a matter outside the president’s authority. “Quite the contrary, we will accelerate the implementation of undertaken commitments,” the statement said “The Association Agreement is part of our governing program, it’s one of the strategic pillars of the country…. and we will deliver on reforms and increase citizen welfare.”<\/p>\n

–“The European Union will not accept a discussion in trilateral format- Moldova, EU and Russia- on the Association Agreement signed with the Republic of Moldova. The question regards only Chi\u0219in\u0103u and Brussels”<\/em>, says a response<\/a> of the EU Delegation to Moldova to MoldNova<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The statement of the EU delegation comes in the context of President Dodon\u2019s declaration at Moscow<\/a> that the Association Agreement has not brought little or any benefits to Moldova, but also Vladimir Putin’s\u00a0aggressive proposal<\/a> to review the contract together with Russia.<\/p>\n

-Political analyst Mihai Pop\u0219oi writes\u00a0that “Dodon\u2019s visit to Moscow has been a major PR stunt for the Socialists, with little to no benefits for\u00a0Moldova”\u00a0<\/em>in his piece “How Dodon sold his country and his soul to Putin”<\/a>. Moreover, the “stunt” has been beneficial for the ruling Democratic Party, who apparently defended the pro-European vector while forgetting the help given to Dodon to win the Presidential elections.<\/p>\n

-On January 17th, the Moldovan President Igor Dodon had a meeting<\/a> in Moscow with the representatives of the Eurasian Economic Union and the head of its Economic Commission, Tigran Sarkisyan.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

In his Facebook post<\/a>, Dodon writes that he would have agreed to sign in Spring a memorandum of cooperation between the Republic of Moldova and the Eurasian Economic Union. Moreover, he asked the union representatives to allow Moldova as an observer state, but also to discuss the formation of a roadmap for Moldova\u2019s integration into the Eurasian Economic Union.<\/p>\n

-The Moldovan President, Igor Dodon, believes<\/a> that the Russian peace-keepers deployed in the breakaway Transnistria are the guarantor of peace in the region. The statement was made during Dodon\u2019s TASS press conference in Moscow, Russia, on January 17th.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Dodon stresses that the peace-keepers appeared in Transnistria for a certain reason in 1992.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is necessary to understand that peacekeepers at the Nistru river did not appear accidentally, but because of the conflict. And they were and remain the guarantor of certain stability. They are there to ensure trust between the banks\u201d,\u00a0<\/em>declared Dodon.<\/p>\n

-The President of Moldova Igor Dodon recognized<\/a> that the debt for natural gas of the breakaway Transnistria is part of Moldova\u2019s total debt to the Russian Gazprom.<\/p>\n

After meeting Gazprom head Alexey Miller on January 17th, Dodon stated that the Moldovan authorities would study the possible variants of paying back, even by including some\u00a0assets used by Moldovagaz, the debt of 500 million US dollars of Moldova. Still, Dodon added $6 billion debt of Transnistria to Moldova\u2019s\u00a0mainland\u00a0<\/em>debt for natural gas.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are certain preliminary plans for resolving this situation. The mainland Moldova\u2019s debt is of nearly US$500 million, while Transnistria\u2019s debt \u2013 nearly US$6 billion. We have to understand that the whole debt \u2013 more than US$6.5 million \u2013 is Moldova\u2019s total debt\u201d<\/em>, Dodon said.<\/p>\n

-On January 17th, the leader of the so-called Pridnestrovian Moldovan Republic, Vadim Krasnoselsky, ordered to fulfill<\/a> his electoral promise to make the natural gas free for socially vulnerable groups of the breakaway Transnistria. Thus, veterans, defenders of Transnistria,<\/em>\u00a0distinct workers and pensioners will receive a quota of 1000 cubic meters of natural gas during the heating season, free of charge.<\/p>\n

The natural gas consumed by the Transnistrian region is only partially paid to Gazprom, the majority of the costs being laid on the Moldovagaz, the main gas supplier of Moldova. During his recent visit to Moscow, the President of Moldova Igor Dodon recognized that the debt for natural gas of the breakaway Transnistria is part of Moldova\u2019s total debt to the Russian Gazprom.\u00a0Dodon added $6 billion debt of Transnistria to Moldova\u2019s\u00a0mainland\u00a0<\/em>debt of $500 million for natural gas, raising anger among the Moldovan citizens who refuse to pay Transnistrian debt as part of the gas tariff.<\/p>\n

-On January 20th, Ambassador Wolf Dietrich Heim concluded his visit in Moldova as the Special Representative of the Austrian OSCE Chairmanship for the Transnistrian Settlement Process. He “assessed the commitment of the sides to engage in a substantive, result-oriented dialogue put forward last year by the 5+2 international partners under the German OSCE Chairmanship” <\/em>and\u00a0“underlined the importance to remain focused on the implementation of the Berlin Protocol and other issues important to both sides, such as the Dubasari farmland issue, the operation of the Latin script schools and freedom of movement of people and goods”.<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The Austrian diplomat also announced that the Austrian Foreign Minister and current Chairman of OSCE, Sebastian Kurz, would visit Moldova in February to prepare the parties of the 5+2 format for a working meeting in 2017.<\/p>\n\n

-On January 16th, 10 Liberal members of the Moldovan Parliament announced<\/a> they initiated a procedure to suspend the President of Moldova, Igor Dodon, and to call a referendum for his dismissal. The Liberal leader Mihai Ghimpu asks for support from the government coalition MPs, since the initiative needs to be signed by at least 34 deputies, which the Liberal caucus does not have, to be valid. According to Ghimpu, Dodon violated the Constitution and the Penal Code when congratulating the separatist leader Vadim Krasnoselski on the election as president of the breakaway Transnistria.<\/p>\n

The Democratic Party, which rules the government coalition, answered to the call by asking the Liberal Party to come with details and arguments at the base of the initiate at the coalition meeting. Moreover, the Democrats say they would agree to sign a request to the Constitutional Court to check on the violations of the Constitution.<\/p>\n

-On January 16th, the Prime-Minister of Moldova, Pavel Filip, rejected<\/a> the Presidential proposal of Igor Dodon to dismiss the Ambassador of the Republic to Romania, his Excellency Mihai Gribincea.\u00a0The proposal was sent on the same day by President Dodon with the claim that Ambassador Gribincea supported an \u201copinion from outside, contrary to the national interests of the Republic of Moldova\u201d\u00a0<\/em>by declaring that the revoking of Moldovan citizenship of the Romania ex-President Traian B\u0103sescu might be doubted in legal terms.<\/p>\n

-On 20 January 2017, the Prime-Minister of Moldova, Pavel Filip, presented the results of his Government in the first year of its activity. According to Filip, the year was hard, but productive for his Cabinet. Here<\/a> are the numbers and results brought by Filip in his report.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Experts see the recovery and growth of Moldova during Filip Government as resulting from the external assistance renewed by the EU, the IMF, the World Bank, following the implementation of several reforms and better management of the banking sector. At the opposite, the civil society has raised concerns throughout 2016 that the current Government does not conduct visible reformation of the justice, with only superficial reform of the Prosecution Office, and that it does not respond to challenges of political<\/em>\u00a0prosecution\u00a0<\/em>and intimidation of journalists and extra-Parliamentary political opponents.<\/p>\n

-The Government of the United Kingdom has launched<\/a> a review of the Scottish Limited Partnerships (SLP) after finding links to the $1 billion frauds in Moldova.<\/p>\n

The UK Government is now questioning the usefulness of SLPs, which have legal capacity to hold assets, borrow money from banks and enter into contacts. The decision comes after finding the use of SLPs for criminal activity such as the transfer of one billion US dollars from three Moldovan banks to shell Scottish companies as loans, sent back to Eastern European banks accounts afterwards.<\/p>\n

-On January 17th, the Buiucani Court of Chi\u0219in\u0103u issued<\/a> another warrant for 30 days of home arrest for the businessman and Orhei mayor\u00a0Ilan Shor. Prosecutor investigating the case, Andrei B\u0103ie\u0219u, declared that the request for home arrest of Shor was accepted with the same reasons, with little exceptions on the need of some expertise of the case.<\/p>\n

Shor is accused of obtaining more than 5 billion lei from Banca de Economii in loans, from 4th to 25th of November 2014, the sum being confirmed by the Kroll report, and then laundering them through offshore companies.<\/p>\n\n

-Zarina Alimbaeva writes at Transitions Online<\/a> that Moldovan prisons are overcrowded and undeveloped.<\/p>\n

“Critics from the Council of Europe to the government itself say Moldova needs a more humane prison system. And they\u2019ve kept on saying it for years”,\u00a0<\/em>says Alimbaeva.<\/p>\n

-On January 16th, the former deputy Prosecutor General of Moldova, Andrei P\u00e2ntea, was condemned<\/a> to 2 years of imprisonment for power abuse in transferring the case of thief-in-law<\/em> Grigore Karamalak to the Russian Federation.<\/p>\n

The same court decided that the former prosecutor should be release under amnesty, since the accusation party asked for it. Therefore, the abuse of power<\/em> was changed to\u00a0involvement in the exercise of justice and penal investigation<\/em>, stipulated by the law on the penal amnesty.<\/p>\n

-Vladimir Botnari, former chief policeman of Chi\u0219in\u0103u, previously judged<\/a> for negligence during the 7 April 2009 revolts, asks prosecutors to bring to justice the journalist of Center for Journalistic Investigations, Mariana Ra\u021b\u0103. Botnari submitted a complaint\u00a0to the Prosecution Office of Chi\u0219in\u0103u, invoking that the journalist accessed and distributed, without his consent, personal data regarding him and members of his family.\u00a0Moreover, the former policeman asks to prosecute everyone that accessed and distributed his personal data starting from October 2009 until now.<\/p>\n

Vladimir Botnari, Screen: ProTV<\/p><\/div>\n

Former chief policeman, who previously held various high\u00a0positions between 2002 and 2009, was judged together with the former Interior Minister Gheorghe Papuc for negligence at service during the revolts in April 2009, resulted in the death of Valeriu Boboc beaten by a policeman. On 30 June 2015, Botnari was acquitted by the Supreme Court of Justice, saving him from suspended two years of detention\u00a0and Papuc from 4 years of imprisonment. Both were revoked of their general military grades.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reading Time: <\/span> 8<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>-On January 17th, the President of the Republic of Moldova, Igor Dodon, met Russia President Vladimir Putin to discuss the Moldo-Russian relations. The Presidents reportedly talked on the Transnistrian conflict settlement,\u00a0returning the Moldovan goods on the Russian market,\u00a0situation of Moldovan working migrants in Russia, economic and commercial cooperation, but also that in the humanitarian and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":443295,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-443316","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-important-en"],"content_social_share":"Reading Time: <\/span> 8<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>

-On January 17th, the President of the Republic of Moldova, Igor Dodon, met<\/a> Russia President Vladimir Putin to discuss the Moldo-Russian relations. The Presidents reportedly talked on the Transnistrian conflict settlement,\u00a0returning the Moldovan goods on the Russian market,\u00a0<\/em>situation of Moldovan working migrants in Russia, economic and commercial cooperation, but also that in the humanitarian and cultural spheres.<\/p>\n

In a joint press conference with Putin, Dodon also declared that he would pledge to cancel the Association Agreement of Moldova with the European Union, if\u00a0his former Socialists\u2019 Party (PSRM) wins a majority at the next Parliament elections.<\/p>\n

\u201c<\/em>By the way, I was always against the signing of this Agreement. This document has brought nothing to the Republic of Moldova. We lost the Russian market. However strange, our exports to the European Union also decreased, so did not get anything from this agreement.<\/i><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t exclude that, after the next Parliamentary elections when I hope that PSRM will obtain a Parliamentary majority, this Agreement will be cancelled<\/i>\u201d<\/em>, declared Dodon at the joint press conference<\/a> with Putin.<\/p>\n\n

Igor Dodon\u2019s statement on the Association Agreement with the EU actually misinforms the public by presenting wrong information and there\u2019s proof<\/a> for that.<\/p>\n

-The Democrat oligarch Vlad Plahotniuc reacted<\/a> to the declaration of the Moldovan President Igor Dodon in Moscow on possibly cancelling the Association Agreement with the European Union. Plahotniuc stressed, in a Facebook post, that Moldova should not show contradictory signals of foreign policy since it has only the European external vector.<\/p>\n

Moldova’s prime minister, Pavel Filip on Wednesday reacted angrily to a suggestion by the nation’s president that the ex-Soviet republic may shelve a trade pact with the European Union. In a statement to The Associated Press<\/a>, Premier Pavel Filip said Moldova’s constitution did not allow the president “to announce or take such decisions,” which he called “pure, political rhetoric.”<\/p>\n

Filip said his pro-European government would “not accept any intervention,” from Dodon about a matter outside the president’s authority. “Quite the contrary, we will accelerate the implementation of undertaken commitments,” the statement said “The Association Agreement is part of our governing program, it’s one of the strategic pillars of the country…. and we will deliver on reforms and increase citizen welfare.”<\/p>\n

–“The European Union will not accept a discussion in trilateral format- Moldova, EU and Russia- on the Association Agreement signed with the Republic of Moldova. The question regards only Chi\u0219in\u0103u and Brussels”<\/em>, says a response<\/a> of the EU Delegation to Moldova to MoldNova<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The statement of the EU delegation comes in the context of President Dodon\u2019s declaration at Moscow<\/a> that the Association Agreement has not brought little or any benefits to Moldova, but also Vladimir Putin’s\u00a0aggressive proposal<\/a> to review the contract together with Russia.<\/p>\n

-Political analyst Mihai Pop\u0219oi writes\u00a0that “Dodon\u2019s visit to Moscow has been a major PR stunt for the Socialists, with little to no benefits for\u00a0Moldova”\u00a0<\/em>in his piece “How Dodon sold his country and his soul to Putin”<\/a>. Moreover, the “stunt” has been beneficial for the ruling Democratic Party, who apparently defended the pro-European vector while forgetting the help given to Dodon to win the Presidential elections.<\/p>\n

-On January 17th, the Moldovan President Igor Dodon had a meeting<\/a> in Moscow with the representatives of the Eurasian Economic Union and the head of its Economic Commission, Tigran Sarkisyan.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

In his Facebook post<\/a>, Dodon writes that he would have agreed to sign in Spring a memorandum of cooperation between the Republic of Moldova and the Eurasian Economic Union. Moreover, he asked the union representatives to allow Moldova as an observer state, but also to discuss the formation of a roadmap for Moldova\u2019s integration into the Eurasian Economic Union.<\/p>\n

-The Moldovan President, Igor Dodon, believes<\/a> that the Russian peace-keepers deployed in the breakaway Transnistria are the guarantor of peace in the region. The statement was made during Dodon\u2019s TASS press conference in Moscow, Russia, on January 17th.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Dodon stresses that the peace-keepers appeared in Transnistria for a certain reason in 1992.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is necessary to understand that peacekeepers at the Nistru river did not appear accidentally, but because of the conflict. And they were and remain the guarantor of certain stability. They are there to ensure trust between the banks\u201d,\u00a0<\/em>declared Dodon.<\/p>\n

-The President of Moldova Igor Dodon recognized<\/a> that the debt for natural gas of the breakaway Transnistria is part of Moldova\u2019s total debt to the Russian Gazprom.<\/p>\n

After meeting Gazprom head Alexey Miller on January 17th, Dodon stated that the Moldovan authorities would study the possible variants of paying back, even by including some\u00a0assets used by Moldovagaz, the debt of 500 million US dollars of Moldova. Still, Dodon added $6 billion debt of Transnistria to Moldova\u2019s\u00a0mainland\u00a0<\/em>debt for natural gas.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are certain preliminary plans for resolving this situation. The mainland Moldova\u2019s debt is of nearly US$500 million, while Transnistria\u2019s debt \u2013 nearly US$6 billion. We have to understand that the whole debt \u2013 more than US$6.5 million \u2013 is Moldova\u2019s total debt\u201d<\/em>, Dodon said.<\/p>\n

-On January 17th, the leader of the so-called Pridnestrovian Moldovan Republic, Vadim Krasnoselsky, ordered to fulfill<\/a> his electoral promise to make the natural gas free for socially vulnerable groups of the breakaway Transnistria. Thus, veterans, defenders of Transnistria,<\/em>\u00a0distinct workers and pensioners will receive a quota of 1000 cubic meters of natural gas during the heating season, free of charge.<\/p>\n

The natural gas consumed by the Transnistrian region is only partially paid to Gazprom, the majority of the costs being laid on the Moldovagaz, the main gas supplier of Moldova. During his recent visit to Moscow, the President of Moldova Igor Dodon recognized that the debt for natural gas of the breakaway Transnistria is part of Moldova\u2019s total debt to the Russian Gazprom.\u00a0Dodon added $6 billion debt of Transnistria to Moldova\u2019s\u00a0mainland\u00a0<\/em>debt of $500 million for natural gas, raising anger among the Moldovan citizens who refuse to pay Transnistrian debt as part of the gas tariff.<\/p>\n

-On January 20th, Ambassador Wolf Dietrich Heim concluded his visit in Moldova as the Special Representative of the Austrian OSCE Chairmanship for the Transnistrian Settlement Process. He “assessed the commitment of the sides to engage in a substantive, result-oriented dialogue put forward last year by the 5+2 international partners under the German OSCE Chairmanship” <\/em>and\u00a0“underlined the importance to remain focused on the implementation of the Berlin Protocol and other issues important to both sides, such as the Dubasari farmland issue, the operation of the Latin script schools and freedom of movement of people and goods”.<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The Austrian diplomat also announced that the Austrian Foreign Minister and current Chairman of OSCE, Sebastian Kurz, would visit Moldova in February to prepare the parties of the 5+2 format for a working meeting in 2017.<\/p>\n\n

-On January 16th, 10 Liberal members of the Moldovan Parliament announced<\/a> they initiated a procedure to suspend the President of Moldova, Igor Dodon, and to call a referendum for his dismissal. The Liberal leader Mihai Ghimpu asks for support from the government coalition MPs, since the initiative needs to be signed by at least 34 deputies, which the Liberal caucus does not have, to be valid. According to Ghimpu, Dodon violated the Constitution and the Penal Code when congratulating the separatist leader Vadim Krasnoselski on the election as president of the breakaway Transnistria.<\/p>\n

The Democratic Party, which rules the government coalition, answered to the call by asking the Liberal Party to come with details and arguments at the base of the initiate at the coalition meeting. Moreover, the Democrats say they would agree to sign a request to the Constitutional Court to check on the violations of the Constitution.<\/p>\n

-On January 16th, the Prime-Minister of Moldova, Pavel Filip, rejected<\/a> the Presidential proposal of Igor Dodon to dismiss the Ambassador of the Republic to Romania, his Excellency Mihai Gribincea.\u00a0The proposal was sent on the same day by President Dodon with the claim that Ambassador Gribincea supported an \u201copinion from outside, contrary to the national interests of the Republic of Moldova\u201d\u00a0<\/em>by declaring that the revoking of Moldovan citizenship of the Romania ex-President Traian B\u0103sescu might be doubted in legal terms.<\/p>\n

-On 20 January 2017, the Prime-Minister of Moldova, Pavel Filip, presented the results of his Government in the first year of its activity. According to Filip, the year was hard, but productive for his Cabinet. Here<\/a> are the numbers and results brought by Filip in his report.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Experts see the recovery and growth of Moldova during Filip Government as resulting from the external assistance renewed by the EU, the IMF, the World Bank, following the implementation of several reforms and better management of the banking sector. At the opposite, the civil society has raised concerns throughout 2016 that the current Government does not conduct visible reformation of the justice, with only superficial reform of the Prosecution Office, and that it does not respond to challenges of political<\/em>\u00a0prosecution\u00a0<\/em>and intimidation of journalists and extra-Parliamentary political opponents.<\/p>\n

-The Government of the United Kingdom has launched<\/a> a review of the Scottish Limited Partnerships (SLP) after finding links to the $1 billion frauds in Moldova.<\/p>\n

The UK Government is now questioning the usefulness of SLPs, which have legal capacity to hold assets, borrow money from banks and enter into contacts. The decision comes after finding the use of SLPs for criminal activity such as the transfer of one billion US dollars from three Moldovan banks to shell Scottish companies as loans, sent back to Eastern European banks accounts afterwards.<\/p>\n

-On January 17th, the Buiucani Court of Chi\u0219in\u0103u issued<\/a> another warrant for 30 days of home arrest for the businessman and Orhei mayor\u00a0Ilan Shor. Prosecutor investigating the case, Andrei B\u0103ie\u0219u, declared that the request for home arrest of Shor was accepted with the same reasons, with little exceptions on the need of some expertise of the case.<\/p>\n

Shor is accused of obtaining more than 5 billion lei from Banca de Economii in loans, from 4th to 25th of November 2014, the sum being confirmed by the Kroll report, and then laundering them through offshore companies.<\/p>\n\n

-Zarina Alimbaeva writes at Transitions Online<\/a> that Moldovan prisons are overcrowded and undeveloped.<\/p>\n

“Critics from the Council of Europe to the government itself say Moldova needs a more humane prison system. And they\u2019ve kept on saying it for years”,\u00a0<\/em>says Alimbaeva.<\/p>\n

-On January 16th, the former deputy Prosecutor General of Moldova, Andrei P\u00e2ntea, was condemned<\/a> to 2 years of imprisonment for power abuse in transferring the case of thief-in-law<\/em> Grigore Karamalak to the Russian Federation.<\/p>\n

The same court decided that the former prosecutor should be release under amnesty, since the accusation party asked for it. Therefore, the abuse of power<\/em> was changed to\u00a0involvement in the exercise of justice and penal investigation<\/em>, stipulated by the law on the penal amnesty.<\/p>\n

-Vladimir Botnari, former chief policeman of Chi\u0219in\u0103u, previously judged<\/a> for negligence during the 7 April 2009 revolts, asks prosecutors to bring to justice the journalist of Center for Journalistic Investigations, Mariana Ra\u021b\u0103. Botnari submitted a complaint\u00a0to the Prosecution Office of Chi\u0219in\u0103u, invoking that the journalist accessed and distributed, without his consent, personal data regarding him and members of his family.\u00a0Moreover, the former policeman asks to prosecute everyone that accessed and distributed his personal data starting from October 2009 until now.<\/p>\n

Vladimir Botnari, Screen: ProTV<\/p><\/div>\n

Former chief policeman, who previously held various high\u00a0positions between 2002 and 2009, was judged together with the former Interior Minister Gheorghe Papuc for negligence at service during the revolts in April 2009, resulted in the death of Valeriu Boboc beaten by a policeman. On 30 June 2015, Botnari was acquitted by the Supreme Court of Justice, saving him from suspended two years of detention\u00a0and Papuc from 4 years of imprisonment. Both were revoked of their general military grades.<\/p>\n

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