Brief history of nowadays Moldova

This is an attempt to recount the history of nowadays Moldova in a nutshell and the simplest way, so that the space for “geopolitical” and “diplomatic” speculations be shrunk as much as possible. It will be appropriate to draw analogies with Ukraine, Romania, other Eastern neighbour or post-Soviet countries, and to glimpse a common pattern and trajectory, although I’m writing this blog as a Moldovan citizen only.

Other articles of my blog expose more factual information, which is also available on request, but this one is deliberately stripped of such, for the only sake to make the elephant in the room visible though.

Twitter, Facebook, the sites of the Moldovan governmental agencies, sites of the foreign embassies to Moldova are riddled with photographs of the EU and US officials, shaking hands with the representatives of the Moldovan governance, and encouraging them to “continue reforms” and implement “further reforms”. Beyond the vexing impact over the Moldovans, it also reveals the lack of the foggiest idea about the country’s recent years, while the repugnant diplomatic clichés are no excuse for that.

It all begins with the basic misuse of the verb “to continue” the reforms, as if they have been ever started. The word “further” implies that there was something “previous”, that there is an ongoing positive process, which ought to be carried on. Along with “continue” and “further”, the EU and US officials also used to embolden the Moldovan government to “accelerate the pace”, as if the direction were right, but only the speed is somehow slower than anticipated. Alas, in fact, we refer to the direction from a fragile democracy to a dictatorship. The Moldovans are witnessing wanton anti-reforms for eight years, while the EU officials keep calling upon to “continue” and even “speed up” something.

Few incontrovertible truths, as prefatory remarks to a short definition of nowadays Moldova:

• It is hypocritical to demand reforms from the very people, who are at power for the last eight years, and because of whom the said reforms are badly required;
• It is naive to expect reforms (independent judiciary is key) from some individuals at power, whose freedom, wellbeing and wealth hinge on their absolute and undivided control over the law-enforcing institutions;
• One must be pretty gullible to expect fair elections from the ones who usurped the power and cling to it as their only chance to escape the jail. It is a conspicuous detachment from reality to call upon the ruling clique to abolish the new election law, which they have recently adopted purposely for securing their majority in the next Parliament. They have hurriedly passed the law not for its subsequent withdrawal;
• Paraphrasing Einstein, you cannot solve the problem with the ones who participated to its creation, especially when the problem is the crime, to which they are all complicit;
• When, from the offices in Brussels, Strasbourg or Washington, one sees "reforms" in Moldova, which no Moldovan does, it characterises the said bureaucrats and the lack of any feedback rather than certain “reforming” process;
• The explanation is implacably simple: there were no reforms because there can be no reforms with the actual regime. Independence of judiciary is suicidal to the clique at power in nowadays Moldova. If the EU and US accept the imitation of reforms, then they will be supplied with plenty of it, but nothing more than feigning and bamboozling;
• Even the word “reform” is misleading in Moldova, as it implies the modification of the legal framework. However, the gross crimes of the last eight years were committed not because the legislation was permissive, but because it was egregiously flouted. The same legal framework applied before the Plahotniuc’s period and nothing remotely like that has happened. The country’s bane is the nominees of the mafia in the highest state positions (especially, in law-enforcing and coercive sector) rather than the alleged imperfection of the legislation, which, by the way, is copied from the German and French ones. Not the laws usurped the power, stole billions of public money, and annulled the rule of law and the democracy, but particular individuals;
• Toying with “drafts of the conceptions of the doctrines of the projects of legislative amendments” instead of ousting the pillars of the regime is their favourite ruse to ensure that nothing changes. It is also the golden trade-off between the Moldovan cunning dignitaries and the EU rapporteurs and bureaucrats busy having an activity. Ironically, instead of applying sanctions to the perpetrators, the EU asks them to elaborate “legal improvements”;
• When the EU calls upon the government of a captive state to “fight corruption”, it only further legitimises the opposition cleansing and the jailing of the dictator’s personal enemies. It is not because of bribes that the law-enforcing agencies fell under the unchallengeable control of one individual and are harnessed to terrorise an entire country. Speaking about corruption (a term applicable to certain extent to any country) with respect to a captive state only plays down the crux and diverts the focus from the paramount problem. In a dictatorship, the dictatorship should be addressed;
• You can hardly find an EU official not accepting the above truths about Moldova, at least, in private. But none of these truths percolate into their public statements. They have a code-word for skilfully shunning the truth — diplomacy — which for the others stands for trivial hypocrisy.

This is roughly all you need to know about nowadays Moldova, a captive state, captured by one single oligarch (Vladimir Plahotniuc), who used to be the grey cardinal of the former communist president Voronin, and who was raised in the last seven years on EU and US political and financial support, at the cost of turning a democracy into a dictatorship, of flushing the country’s working population out to seek sources of existence, of devastating a four-million country along with destroying its people’s aspirations for European integration.

Vladimir Plahotniuc, , a.k.a. Плахотнюк Владимир Георгиевич (Plakhotnyuk Vladimir), Russian citizen, a.k.a. Vlad Ulinici according to his another Romanian identity

Below I am going to slightly elaborate on the subject. If you are tempted to suspect that some passages below are somehow exaggerated or over-dramatised, it just flags up that your knowledge about Moldova need to be updated. We often reject the bare truth until the tragedy is irremediable.

The onset

When the organised criminal group led by the oligarch Vladimir Plahotniuc (ironically entitled “Democratic Party”) came at power in 2010 and started to gradually seize the power, Moldova was still a democratic country. A post-Soviet, incipient, unsettled, imperfect, emerging, but yet a democracy. Now it is an accomplished captive state.

"This captured state must be returned to its citizens."
Thorbjørn Jagland, Secretary General of the Council of Europe,
„Bring Moldova Back From the Brink”, The New York Times, 10 August 2015

During the last eight years,

• the three levels of the judiciary (including the Appeal and Supreme Court) plus the Constitutional Court, the public prosecution system (including the Prosecutor General’s Office), and the National Anticorruption Centre (NAC) have been completely taken over and used at the behest of one thuggish individual;
• all other state institutions have been subjugated under the pressure of the said resurrected and revamped repressive machine;
• twenty-five years after the fall of the communist regime, political prisoners reappeared in Moldova;
• the election law has been changed to perpetuate Plahotniuc at power and the Election Commission fully subverted;
• the free press has been methodically stifled and clamped down;
• the opposition cleansing and the reprisals against the Plahotniuc’s opposers have become daily routine and the only concern of the Moldovan repressive organs (Prosecutor General’s Office NAC and judiciary);
• the rule of law, the human rights and the democracy are annulled.

For eight years, Moldova has been steadily degenerating, while the EU and US kept suggesting “to continue” something even “further”, and even “accelerate the pace”. Now try to read the words in quotes with the eyes of the Moldovans, hostages in their own country.

The “glorious” period

During 2010-2017, the EU has fed unprecedented financial and unparalleled political support to the Moldovan government, raising an insolent dictator on the EU’s Eastern border, on the EU taxpayers’ money. Within the said period, the EU and US officials used to repeat that they underpin the Moldovan people rather than necessarily the country’s current government, but in the meantime kept financing the regime in Moldova. That’s where and when the striking dichotomy, duplicity, demagoguery, “geopolitical” cynicism and “realpolitik” kick in.

For eight years, the EU, US and IMF are providing new instalments to the ones who had earlier stolen the previous tranches, and those new instalments are meant to cover the hole, produced by the previous embezzlements [here is the diagram exemplifying one of such thefts]. This is the gist of the queer relationship with the Moldovan kleptocratic authorities: the EU, US and IMF pay new tranches to the same thieves, who has earlier successfully embezzled the previous ones, and then call it “stabilisation”.

Ordinary bureaucrats

To ensure their personal comfort and to eschew personal conflicts with the Moldovan clique, the EU bureaucrats turned the blind eye on the reprised victims of the human rights violations in Moldova. Those, directly in charge for monitoring the human rights in Moldova, preferred to discuss the gross violations with the perpetrators (at power) rather than the afflicted victims, leaving the aggrieved abandoned before the entire repressive machine. It was sort of providing alibi for criminals and showing to the Moldovan society which side the EU is on.

The EU and US representatives strictly avoid any contacts with the repressed victims in order not to annoy Plahotniuc, the one who commanded the reprisals. Moreover, there is a tacit rule among the diplomatic community in Moldova to never pronounce the name of Plahotniuc. The diplomats are frightened of wiretapping, blackmail and revenge for such a hazardous dare. And it disgracefully occurs in a country "member of the EU Eastern Partnership", within which Moldova used to be remarked as "leader" by that diplomatic community. As for their elusive public statements painstakingly devoid of any hints to Plahotniuc, it is like describing the Medieval plague that devastated Europe, without ever mentioning the word "plague".

This attitude, coupled with the infinitely protracted terms of examination of the violations by the ECHR, offered plenty of time and cover-up to Plahotniuc for annihilating his opponents and the victims he robbed, with impunity and under the EU rhetoric of “further supporting” his government on the path of “European integration”. The EU cynicism, demagoguery and hypocrisy forced a large formerly pro-EU electorate to morph into anti-EU. Nor up till today the EU has publicly disavowed its endorsement for the clique at power in Moldova.

EU representatives' recklessness and gullibility invite abusers, and Plahotniuc was waiting at the doorstep. However, as regards Moldova, it is questionable whether it was mere gullibility. When the EU officials are duly informed on the outrages committed by the Moldovan authorities (i.e. Plahotniuc) and they “congratulate, support and further encourage” the perpetrators, it begs serious questions and founded suspicions. Those plain questions have been never posed to the EU and US officials in charge for Moldova. This blog is just another source for inspiration.

How about people?

The Moldovans can readily conceive that the EU and US are not bound to support anyone, the more so financially. What the Moldovans still cannot grasp is why the EU and US needed to bolster the main enemy of the Moldova’s people ― Plahotniuc and his gang. Nor do the Moldovans understand what they did so wrong to the EU and US so that these two retaliate by financing and providing political umbrella to a usurper, within a modern type of civil war waged against the population. The reluctance to support the righteous, on one hand, and the determination to support the evil, on another, are two pretty different degrees of defiance.

The Moldovans admit that the EU and US may not be willing to punish the dictator they raised and condone, but why then not to protect the victims of the dictator’s wanton outrages, at least, by mere statements in their defence, which cost nothing in comparison to €6 billion invested into the regime last years.

To their complete bewilderment and bitter disappointment, the Moldovans discovered that, on the EU Eastern border and within the EU Eastern Partnership programme, the EU officials hasten to repudiate the very foundation stones, on which the EU itself is built ― the rule of law and the human rights. Realities belie their declarative statements. It appears that this generation of the EU officials feels no affection for the ideals and desiderata of their predecessors.

Even worse than in the communist times

Moldova is in the deepest predicament. The ordeal has coincidentally befallen the country during the “association agreement”. The Moldovans used to say that during the communist regime the situation wasn’t less desperate either, but at least it was cogently explainable to the Westerners, who were well aware about those times’ mockery and disdain for the rule of law and human rights. Now it is more insidious, since the debauchery is being committed by the swindlers, disguised as the “pro-European” and under the veneer of pro-European rhetoric. For these myths to get dispelled it took a pretty long time ― enough for Plahotniuc to successfully finalise the state capture.

For the post-Soviet Moldovan society, it was hard to oppose to the relic mafiotic groups, however the Moldovans have been opposing. As for the period, when the EU endowed and empowered Plahotniuc with new alliances, the balance tilted dramatically against the people. Without the EU and US political lever and the apparent “legitimacy” deriving from it, Plahotniuc stood no chance.

Geopolitics and realpolitik

Even if one were to admit that a whole country’s population is cynically sacrificed for some “geopolitical” lofty reasons from the mind of some US strategists, then not even those imaginary objectives were achieved. On the contrary, the US and EU attitude was pushing the Moldovans into the arms of the US and EU opponents rather than making allies of them. Instead of gravitational pull, it has strongly boosted the repulsive force. Simply because the local ruthless mafia is incomparably more unbearable than any external menace, whether real or invented.

Here is when Plahotniuc managed to con the US and EU into choosing between the two evils: him, a real but purportedly a “lesser” one; or the external threat, virtual but purportedly “bigger”. In the strategists’ star wars, one can always draw a bigger hypothetical thread to any real one, while the country’s population is irrelevant and simply doesn’t matter in the equation, and therefore discarded as a collateral expandable or cannon fodder.

As to the enticement of bargaining and flirting with dictators for short-term tactical positions at the expense of the country's population, not only is it vile, immoral, infamous and historically disgraceful, but it is also entrenching in Moldova the culture of impunity and thugs’ almightiness, like in the cruellest African dictatorships. Thanks god Moldova has no oil or nuclear weapon — it would be scary then to imagine the extent of the trade-off between the same actors.

Raider attacks

There are EU monitoring mechanisms and international organisations for the rule of law and human rights working in Moldova for many years. What are they for, if the hijacking of an entire country has been going undetected for seven years? Seven years of recklessly disregarding the stream of alarming signals from the country. Nor did the abundant European and American press determine those organisations and the EU Delegation to Moldova, in particular, to observe the collapse of the democracy in the very country they happened to be in charge for.

"Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" is Latin for "Who watches the watchmen?"
[Use of judiciary and law-enforcement, diagram here]

In 2010 and 2011 Moldova was rocked by the so-called raider attacks. This is a form of organised crime, imported from Russia and Ukraine, which consists in grabbing private and public assets by arbitrary judgments. Overnight, Plahotniuc became the owner of 70%-80% of the domestic banking and insurance sector, without investing a cent. This was the Plahotniuc’s way of becoming the wealthiest man in Moldova. A year later, in 2012, the High Court of London and the Cassation Court of Edinburgh found Plahotniuc as the ultimate beneficial owner of the raider attacks’ spoils, but not even this public fact impinged on the EU attitude. Despite the magnitude of the impact, not a single word is dropped by the EU to these days.

For a raider attack to succeed, the raider must ensure his absolute control over the judiciary, General Prosecutor’s Office, the National Bank, the National Anticorruption Centre. If one of the said state institutions had not acted under the baton of the raider, the attacks would have simply failed. This is why the raider attack is the unmistakable signature of the captive state, unrestrained arbitrariness and the annulled rule of law.

Even though the EU was duly informed on the raider attacks [link to some examples], there was no reaction, which is self-incriminatory. Instead, few months after the raider attacks, at the end of 2011, the EU issued the First Progress Report on Moldova for Visa Liberalisation. Four more laudatory reports ensued, culminating with the Visa-Free reward in 2014. By then, the European press was boiling with articles about the raider attacks in Moldova and the state institutions captured by the raider Plahotniuc [see the press compilation]. Few months after the Visa Liberalisation, in the same year of 2014, the Moldovan kleptocratic government (that’s to say Plahotniuc) stole one billion dollars from the country’s National Reserves, to whose formation the EU and US had contributed significantly.

Put mildly, the EU officials and the Moldovan reality have continued to live in parallel universes. Put otherwise, it is the definition of sheer complicity. [more on raider attacks here] [here the raider attacks are explained simply]

Magnitsky case

One billion of public funds were embezzled through and from the banks, hijacked earlier by raider attacks. The avoidance of any EU reaction to the raider attacks led to increasingly more brazen subsequent crimes, as described in the next section. This is where the EU’s favourable word “encouraged” would be used properly.

The phenomenon of raider attacks in Moldova wasn’t new to the EU and US. The most internationally recognisable raider attack is the Case of Magnitsky, who was killed in the Moscow prison after the embezzlement. The annihilation of the robbed victims is the indispensable part of the raiders’ criminal plan. Hunting and silencing the victims and witnesses of the Plahotniuc's raids in Moldova is a long-standing priority for the entire Moldovan repressive machine and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to these days.

The Magnitsky Act, known as “Russia and Moldova Jackson–Vanik Repeal and Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act of 2012”, was passed by the U.S. Congress in 2012. The US established the Magnitsky List of personal sanctions, to which the EU adhered later.

Heist of the century

As mentioned in the above, few years after hijacking the main banks during the raider attack of 2010-2011, those banks were used for the “heist of the century” ― the misappropriation of one billion dollars from the National Reserves of Moldova (one billion is roughly one eighth of the national GDP). By design, the theft was perpetrated one working day before the elections of 27 November 2014 [here is the explanatory diagram].

The proponents and signatories of the secret decisions enacting the fraud are the incumbent Chairman of the Parliament, Andrian Candu (deputy chairman of the Plahotniuc’s Democratic Party and his godson); Iurie Leanca, the then Prime Minister and current deputy Prime Minister for the European Integration (note: “for European Integration”); Dorin Dragutanu, the then Governor of the National Bank. The incumbent Prime Minister, Pavel Filip, deputy chairman of the Plahotniuc’s Democratic Party and his nominee, was also among the signatories of the heist. So was the current Minister for the Economy, Chiril Gaburici.

[From left to right] Signatories of the heist: Andrian Candu, Iurie Leanca and Dorin Dragutanu

[From left to right] Signatories of the heist, Chiril Gaburici and Pavel Filip, and the only intermediary Ilan Shor

Here is the verbatim transcript of the secret Government meeting, in which Andrian Candu was urging the others to allocate one billion to the Shor's banks.

Today you may see them posing with the EU and US officials. They don’t even conceal the fact of their participation in robbing a whole country. It is noteworthy that the National Reserves are being formed with the financial contribution of the US and the EU countries. Hence, on the photographs, the EU officials are shaking hands with their robbers, literally.

An American investigator (Kroll) was hired to unravel the scam. Kroll has documentarily established that the huge amount had been funnelled from Moldova through the companies of Ilan Shor. Even though he is formally convicted by the first instance court, he keeps walking free, unimpeded and unconstrained. He stated that he was just an intermediary, but if the Moldovan prosecutors will threaten him with arrest, he will disclose the name of the beneficiary. So did Dragutanu (the then Governor of the National Bank) say as well.

After more than three years, not a single cent is recouped. The billion is not found, because it is not sought. Rather than doing his duty, the Prosecutor General’s Office (another Plahotniuc’s nominee) is tasked to ensure that no effective investigative measures are being carried out. Once the key state institutions acting under the Plahotniuc’s absolute control have concertedly partook in the heist, there simply cannot be any other beneficiary than Plahotniuc.

The thieves are not going to return the stolen money — that is not what they did it for. Moldova needs independent prosecutors and investigators to properly prosecute the perpetrators. Kroll established the funds’ further destination, which is also in the EU and US. But, three years after the theft, not even formal interpellations are sent by the Moldovan prosecutors. If the EU and US genuinely want to help the people of Moldova, they would better assist in finding the misappropriated billion, rather than keep covering its disappearance with new instalments paid to the thieves of that billion.

Stolen money as “heavy argument”

One billion in hands of Plahotniuc proves a heavy “argument”. The amount is big enough to start protecting itself and its owner. Since 2014, the largest US lobbyists (Podesta, Cornerstone Government Affairs, Prime Policy Group, Burson-Marsteller, Cogent Strategies LLS) have been hired to this end [more information on American lobbyists of Plahotniuc].

It is noteworthy that some of the lobby contracts (e.g. with Cogent Strategies LLS) were signed by Cristina Balan, vice-chairman of Plahotniuc's "Democratic Party", recently appointed as Moldovan Ambassador to Washington [links here and here]. Other contracts were signed by Constantin Botnari, alias "Borsetka", the closest crony of Plahotniuc and "Secretary General" of his pocket "Democratic Party" [more information on Plahotniuc's lobbyists here]. Mr Botnari was wiretapped instructing the party's members to support the pro-Russian candidate for presidency, Igor Dodon, although Plahotniuc was fooling the EU and US with his ostensible support of pro-European candidates [link here].

Even Ilan Shor, mentioned on every page of the Kroll report and sentenced by the first instance, encounters no trouble to meet with some MEPs in Strasbourg and Brussels, and even invite them to Moldova [link]. Inside the European Parliament, a group of Romanian MEPs (mostly PSD-affiliated) consolidated to protect Plahotniuc and hinder any adverse to him reactions of the European Parliament. As it ironically turns out, now the EU has to confront the campaign, financed from the stolen funds, to which the EU contributed earlier.

Along with “material incentives”, the arsenal of Plahotniuc also comprise wiretapping, blackmail, and additional “inducements” from the earlier times, when Plahotniuc has been a pimp, in international search by the Italian Interpol for women trafficking [link to Interpol Notice].

“A list of all Romanian and European leaders, who have used the "services" of Plahotniuc's girls (often minor), and of those from the payment list of the odious oligarch, both in Bucharest and elsewhere, in order to establish the size of the Plahotniuc's octopus (network) in Romania and around the world.
One cannot turn the leader of the criminal world in a state into the main pro-European vector.”
Dr. Armand Goșu, Associate Professor, 14 March 2017 [the link to the article is here].

Pernicious message

Let me emphasise the essence of the previous paragraphs: as you read this blog, US and EU officials are meeting, discussing, flirting, taking snapshots and “encouraging” the representatives of the Moldovan clique, the Plahotniuc’s cronies and acolytes, the usurpers and their accomplices, the signatories of the heist of one billion [here the gallery of some eloquent snapshots]. The messages don’t pass unnoticed by the Moldovans. Each snapshot and each handshaking is quantified in votes and their shift from pro-EU/US to anti-EU/US. As simple as that: eyes are more persuasive than diplomatic sophisms, platitudes and obnoxious demagoguery.

It is evocative that at the last elections in Moldova the Kremlin did nothing to turn half of the Moldovan voters away from the EU, neither did Moscow steal the billion, nor did Russia invest a single cent, minute of time or joule of effort to jeopardise the EU. The EU took care of all that by itself. We doubt that the responsible EU dignitaries are going to be held liable for such a “success”. While calling upon Moldovan authorities to confront the Russian propaganda, for the EU it wouldn’t be difficult to ascertain that the propaganda in question pours into Moldova through the media holding belonging to Plahotniuc as individual 100% ownership [link #1 and link #2 here].

Another trick

Whereas the egregious misrepresentation started to ring the bell in the Western press, the EU was forced to consider “conditioning” the ensuing financial support of the Moldovan government. Imposing “conditionalities” is at first sight a fair and judicious covenant: financing is granted only after the conditions are fulfilled, i.e. money on deliverables only. The parties convened on 40 or so conditions, amongst which the independence of judiciary and public prosecution are also somehow vaguely indicated.

The tricky pitfall lies in vague criteria and palpability of results, but essentially in the sheer number of the preconditions. The cunning Plahotniuc’s government was always delighted to report progresses in any field, except those which shake the dictator’s toolset and mainstay ― the “repressive organs”, Moldovan judiciary and public prosecution. Technically, the more non-judiciary-independence conditions, the higher the reported fulfilment marker. The percentage may keep mounting, giving spurious credence to some progress and hence “legitimising the government endeavour and commitment”, while the real situation will keep relentlessly deteriorating.

The rule of law and its central pivot (the independence of the judiciary) must take precedence over anything else and is the condition “sine qua non” ― unless it is ensured, no other conditions count. It is indeed the case when more than one condition means no conditions at all. The long list of conditions is only meant to blur the answer to whether the Moldovan government complies or not, because there will always be plenty of peripheral issues that they will be pleased to report as “checked”.

Most humans agreed on most of right things in principle (on paper), while only the priorities betray the true intentions, especially when it comes to their implementation.

Personal sanctions unavoidable

In Moldova, the big robberies and expropriations, the raider attacks, the blatant disdain for human rights and the rule of law, the politically driven reprisals, and the heinous crimes against the society are being committed by judges and prosecutors. In Moldova, you can complain against the perpetrators only to the same perpetrators, i.e. to your own executioners.

Even the most credulous ones cannot envisage that Plahotniuc would agree to release the judiciary or Prosecutors’ Office from his grip, and get arrested shortly thereafter. The instinct of self-preservation outweighs the flattery about “principles”, “values” and “conditions”. Personal sanctions against Plahotniuc and his closest accomplices (similarly to those of the Magnitsky List) are inevitable, and the sooner the better for the people of Moldova. It ought to draw the crisp red line in the today's haziness of the relations between the three groups of actors: the EU and US, the usurpers in Moldova, and the country’s population. Happily, unlike neighbour countries (say Ukraine or Romania), there is only one oligarch in Moldova, on whom the entire pyramid hinges.

One more remark on the Magnitsky List of personal sanctions: on that List, you won’t find individuals that pro-eminent as Plahotniuc, who captured the state, subdued the judiciary, robbed 17% of the national GDP, annulled the democratic mechanism, installed the dictatorship, and is unipersonally responsible for all that. If the people currently on the List deserved their inclusion, then Plahotniuc deserves it hundredfold. If there are criteria for the List, and not indicative preferences, than Plahotniuc must indisputably top it with excellence. Sooner or later, personal sanctions against the oligarch Plahotniuc have to be enforced, and the sooner the more could be saved from the debris of a ruined country. There is simply no other way to cope with the Moldovan regime.

The first signs of waking up

By the end of the aforementioned “glorious” period of the artificially inflated “success story of Moldova”, the EU caught itself completely bamboozled, manipulated and exposed as the bosom ally of the Moldovan people’s biggest enemy. Albeit duly informed since 2010, only since 2017 the EU has begun to recognise that the Moldovan cunning governance has been fooling the EU with “reforms” in judiciary, while not a single promise had been ever even intended.

On the contrary, Plahotniuc felt free to promote his cronies and eliminate the last independent judges and prosecutors, in the most overt and defiant to the International community manner. He also felt unconstrained to execute his opponents and the victims of human rights violations, confident that the EU officials won’t deign to reply a single word of protest. Within few years of “European pathway”, by means of raider attacks, Plahotniuc became the wealthiest man in the poorest country of Europe, and these two events are tightly entwined ― the poorer Moldova, the wealthier Plahotniuc, by using the captive judiciary to grab private and public properties, and the General Prosecutor’s Office to hound, persecute, jail and annihilate the robbed victims and his political opponents.

The situation kept worsening critically, while the EU reports were exhibiting optimism and bravado, and the EU diplomats were showing themselves content, at least, in their public statements. Not only did the entire system of the EU auditing, surveillance and monitoring bodies prove useless, futile and misleading, but it also facilitated the blatant misrepresentation of facts on Moldova. It turned out that the EU paid to be misled and then loudly celebrated it.

Association with the evil

Back in 2010, before entering “programmes” and “associating agreements” with the EU, the majority of Moldovans (70%-80%) were ardent pro-EU supporters. Seven years later, after a euphoric political support and unprecedented financial aid (no other country enjoyed such one) granted by the EU to Moldova, the proportions pro and against EU have inverted.

It is so crucial that I feel obligated to repeat it: you take a completely pro-EU country, invest the largest amount per capita (throughout the entire EU history), and at the end get a population utterly disappointed in the EU. It is not oftentimes when the EU and US pay their taxpayers’ money and their reputation for their own discrediting. Now the problem, created by the previous EU money in erecting a dictatorship in Moldova, will require new EU budgets to fight it.

There is only one factor that dependably accounts for this epic failure ― the EU and US association and homogenisation with the most despised politician in Moldova (Plahotniuc) and his personal rating of (minus)-98%. As citizens of any other country would do, the Moldovans got the message: tell me who’s your friend and I will tell who are you.

Recapitulation

If sliding down into an cruel tribal dictatorship; resurrecting the Soviet NKVD practices, terror and outrages; annulment of the human rights and rule of law; pushing the country to the brink of genocide and humanitarian catastrophe; forcing most of the working population out of the country in search for basic livelihood for their families' survival; are labelled “European integration”, than this is clearly not what the Moldovans have anticipated. This is manifestly the case when the objective is being jeopardised by the bureaucrats in charge for its achievement.

It's a resentful disappointment to see a respectable organisation (the EU) forfeiting its capacity to cope with its own mistakes, merely resorting to saving its esprit de corps and pretending that there were no errant and infamous years. Now, before resuming talks about the “European integration” in Moldova, one must start by saying that it is not what the Moldovans have endured the last years, but something completely different and even opposed, and that “European integration” was just a misnomer.

Someday, Moldova is unavoidably going to be in the EU, but not before the EU becomes EU itself.