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On Monday June 15, at the second Moldova - European Union Intergovernmental Conference hosted in Luxembourg the EU officially opened the first negotiating cluster with Moldova and Ukraine. Four years after getting candidate status the EU’s 27 member state all approved the start of official negotiations. President Sandu marked this milestone stating:

"Today, the Republic of Moldova took another step on its European path: we opened negotiations on the first group of chapters, Fundamental Values,"

"We got here thanks to the work we put in together and the effort of people who believe in the European future of the Republic of Moldova. Our country is moving forward, and the road ahead still requires perseverance. But today we have one more reason to be confident: the accession of the Republic of Moldova to the European Union is no longer a distant goal, but a reality that we are already building,"

This event ends nearly 2 years of political paralysis and begins the real process of negotiations. Let’s look at what this means and what comes next.

What’s a Cluster Again?

The EU accession process is broken down into 33 negotiating chapters. These in turn are grouped into 6 main negotiating clusters. They are:

1. Fundamentals (judiciary, fundamental rights, rule of law, public procurement, public administration, etc)

2. Internal Market (free movement of goods, workers, capital, etc)

3. Competitiveness and Inclusive Growth (taxation, science, research, education, etc)

4. Green Agenda and Sustainable Connectivity (transport, energy, trans-EU networks, climate change, etc)

5. Resources, Agriculture and Cohesion (agriculture policy, food veterinary and phytosanitary safety, fisheries, etc)

6. External Relations (foreign, security and defense policy)

The most important cluster is Fundamentals - it is the first one to be opened and the last to close. Given Moldova’s struggles with corruption and work at justice reform it is also the most challenging1.

President Sandu has stated that Moldova is prepared to open all negotiating clusters. Various outlets have reported EU officials targeting July for opening the remaining clusters, but it is unclear how firm that timeline is. Moldova has been working informally on each cluster and has made significant process on 2/3 of the chapters in the last year. You can track progress chapter by chapter at this link.

A Milestone for Moldova and Ukraine

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy welcomed the news stating:

“We’ve worked hard to reach this point. In recent years, Ukraine and Moldova have taken important steps forward together. It’s especially symbolic that I’m addressing you today from Chisinau on my way to France, where I’ll attend the G7 summit. Our good-neighborly relations with Moldova are strong. We support each other and move forward together on the path to European integration. And together, we will achieve this goal,”

Interestingly, President Zelenskyy was in Chisinau transiting the country on his way to the G7 summit in France. This was his second time using the Chisinau airport for transit with the first being June 9 when he returned from a trip to London via Chisinau. On that occasion he met with US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner at the Chisinau airport for what he called a “very positive conversation.”

Ukrainian delegations have primarily used the airport in Rzeszów Poland for international travels after February 2022. While no official reason for the change has been given, it comes against the backdrop of cooling Ukrainian - Polish relations2.

The location highlights just how close Moldova and Ukraine have become in recent years and serves as a reminder that the countries’ paths towards Europe have thus far been linked.

How Significant is This?

Overall, that remains to be seen. Procedurally, it is a big deal. Until now Moldova had negotiations in name but not in practice. Moldova and Ukraine attained candidate status in June 2022 and negotiations officially opened in late 2024. Since then there has been lots of behind the scenes work but officially the process was stuck in a sort of accession limbo. With the first cluster open the countries will actual begin back and forth negotiations on membership. Procedurally, the next milestone will be the opening of the other 5 clusters.

Politically the opening of the first cluster is a win for those who support EU enlargement. In Moldova, it sends a signal to voters that there is real movement and that EU membership is a tangible goal.

What is far less clear is what this move signals overall. France, Germany and other EU members are circulating a number of proposals for how to proceed that reflect very different underlying assumptions country to country. The opening of the first cluster was largely delayed by Hungary’s veto - which was wielded against Ukraine not Moldova. Orban’s hostility to Ukraine masked broader discomfort across multiple EU countries and his removal has brought those issues into the open.

As Moldova and Ukraine move towards the potential of opening other clusters in July, a key area to watch will be whether the countries de-couple in the process. Up until this point Moldova and Ukraine have been joined by various geopolitical dynamics. Now, that may change. Moldova’s smaller size and the fact that the country is not at war could mean that it moves ahead in terms of technical reforms. Meanwhile, some ideas from member states envision a geopolitical priority lane for Ukraine - but not Moldova. Now that actual negotiations are starting these issues become much less theoretical and the potential for a decoupling of the 2 countries increases.

Going forward the primary signal to watch is the speed with which the other 5 clusters open. If they are all opened in 2026 or in early 2027 then Moldova’s goal of membership by 2030 remains possible. If no more clusters open this year or if they are slow rolled then it is not. Opening cluster 1 this week means that the sprint to 2030 remains possible - but only that.

Hungarian Prime Minister Peter Magyar announced that Hungary and Ukraine had agreed on a new framework to protect the rights of the Hungarian minority in Ukraine’s Zakarpattia region. This move has renewed hopes of unblocking the opening of negotiating clusters between Ukraine and the EU. Commissioner for Enlargement Marta Kos praised this progress, writing:

“Prime Minister Magyar’s announcement of the agreement between Hungary and Ukraine to promote minority rights paves the way for progress in Ukraine’s EU accession process.

This will allow Member States to move forward with work on opening the first chapter of negotiations with Ukraine and Moldova. Ukraine and Moldova already meet the rule of law requirements set by Member States.

It is time to accelerate the process of accession of these countries to the EU. This is the best way to ensure respect for minority rights,”

When announcing the agreement with Ukraine, Peter Magyar announced Hungary’s support for opening negotiating clusters but not for an accelerated membership for Ukraine. He stated:

“Hungary does not support accelerated EU accession negotiations. If Ukraine manages to close all 33 accession chapters within 10 or 15 years, our country will hold a decisive, legally binding referendum on this issue,”

These announcements come amidst a flurry of activity seemingly aimed at creating pressure to finally begin negotiations. The European Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee voted decisively on June 3 to accelerate Moldova’s accession and to open negotiating clusters - noting particularly the country’s progress on justice reform. Moldova has had a parliamentary delegation in Brussels for meetings and Deputy PM for European Integration Cristina Gherasimov called these developments an “important signal” and stated that EU Council level discussions will soon take place to finalize the last administrative procedures for opening negotiations.

After many delays it is possible that Moldova and Ukraine will begin officially negotiating this month or early next. We’ll follow this story and update you as it develops.

Trump Nominates a US Ambassador to Moldova

In an unexpected announcement, the White House nominated 40 ambassadorial positions on June 1 sending the list to the Senate for confirmation. This list included the following nomination for Moldova:

“Joseph Burkhalter, of Georgia, to be Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America to the Republic of Moldova.”

Joseph Mark Burkhalter, generally referred to as Mark Burkhalter, is a businessman and former state legislator in Georgia. He does not have direct foreign policy experience, but has had business ties outside the US including in the UK. Burkhalter studied Political Science, German and Slavic languages while an undergrad at the University of Georgia1. This would mark the first time that a political appointee has been made ambassador to Moldova.

In 2020 President Trump nominated Mark Burkhalter to be the US Ambassador to Norway. His nomination was later withdrawn over a resurfaced 1994 scandal in which Burkhalter authorized and distributed a racist campaign flyer2 that lawsuits from the time alleged was designed to emphasize a democratic incumbent’s race. Incumbent Gordon Joyner’s face was blackened, one eye distorted, lips thickened and he was given an afro. Burkhalter later admitted to authorizing and later covering up the payment for the flyer in violation of Georgia House ethics laws. He paid a civil penalty and apologized to Joyner.

Moldova has not had a US Ambassador since Ambassador Kent Logsdon departed in June 2024.

Analysis: Will this impact his new nomination?

Not likely. The scandal around his 2020 nomination was set against the backdrop of the Black Lives Matter movement and a national discussion around race in the United States. The fight against his nomination was led by Democratic Senator Bob Menendez at a time of Democratic confidence after the 2018 midterms and going into the 2020 Presidential Elections. This weekend, Bob Menendez will mark 1 year in prison as he serves an 11 year sentence for corruption3 against the backdrop of a democratic party in substantial disarray.

At the same time, it is very possible that all of these nominations will get caught up on complex Senate politics ahead of the midterms this year. We’ll just have to wait and see.

Other Foriegn Affairs and Security News

Here’s a roundup of the other top stories of the week:

• Fallout from the Russian drone strike in Romania. Following last week’s drone attack Romanian President Nicușor Dan has been absolutely clear in attributing the attack to Russia. Romania expelled the Russian Consul General in Constanta in response and announced consultation with NATO allies. Romania also announced a deal on joint drone production with Ukraine. This follows similar moves by the Gulf states in the context of the Iran war as more and more countries turn to Ukraine for counter-drone expertise.

• Igor Dodon, Vasile Tarlev and Victoria Furtună attend the St. Petersburg Economic Forum. They spoke of the need for Moldova to return to the CIS, join the Eurasian Economic Community, open negotiations with Gazprom, drop sanctions against Russia, etc. The forum, often called the “Russian Davos,” took place against the backdrop of overnight Ukrainian strikes on military targets in the region that send billows of black smoke over the city. This year’s forum also saw the return of a US delegate for the first time since 2018 in the form of Rodney Mims Cook Jr., Chairman of the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts. A group of online influencers / conspiracy theorists including Candace Owens and the Tate brothers also attended the event.

Political Updates

Here’s a roundup of the top political stories of the week:

• The Archbishop of Chisinau and Metropolitan of Bessarabia resigned amidst scandal. Archbishop Petru’s resignation was announced by church officials citing the 80 year old’s age, health and that it was for “for the good of the Church.” That last part was likely doing the heavy lifting. Shortly after his resignation unverified videos began to circulate allegedly showing the Archbishop having sexual relations with an unknown man. These videos were immediately spread by various Telegram channels and used as attacks against both the Metropolis of Bessarabia and the LGBTQ community. This is not the first time that the Archbishop has faced accusations. In 2014 a number of junior clergy made public allegations about recent and historical sexual advances by the Archbishop. The Metropolis of Bessarabia made statements distancing itself from the conduct in the video “if true.”

• Local elections conclude. In Orhei, independent candidate Ramiz Ansarov won the second round mayoral elections with 57% of the vote. While he ran as an independent he formerly ran for parliament on the party lists of the Heart of Moldova Party. In Taraclia, Socialist Candidate Iacobceac Ecaterina won the mayoral race with 51%. Both towns will now have non-Shor administrations for the first time in many years.

• “Mr. Nobody Against Putin” shown in Chisinau. The Oscar and BAFTA award winning documentary was shown in Chisinau at an event attended by director and protagonist Pavel Talankin. Many people posted pictures with Mr. Talankin and his Oscar online. The film shows the rapid onset of indoctrination and militarism in Russian schools following the invasion of Ukraine. Pavel Talankin worked at a school in a small Russian city and filmed this process before escaping to the West. Speaking at the event, he noted that the Russian authorities took note of who fled the country at the onset of the war and who didn’t. He stated:

“The Kremlin looked out the window and asked: ‘What generation is leaving?’ They did an analysis and realized that exactly the generation that grew up after the collapse of the USSR, which had not been educated in this propaganda, was leaving. Then they stormed schools and kindergartens to forcefully introduce indoctrination,”

For anyone who hasn’t seen the film, I strongly recommend it. It portrays a chilling representation of how this war has changed Russia and leaves you with the clear sense that there will not be any return to normal when it ends. Here’s the trailer:

The city of Galați is around 20 km from the port of Reni in Ukraine and around 60 km from the larger port of Izmail. Galați is even closer to the Moldovan border and port of Giurgiulești. Russian attacks against Ukraine’s Danube delta ports have been frequent since the start of the war and Romania’s adjacent counties often push out “Ro-Alerts” to residents telling them to seek shelter1. This is the first time though that any Russian drone has stuck such a large piece of civilian infrastructure outside of Ukraine.

The Romanian authorities report that 2 F16 fighters had been scrambled with permission to shoot down the drone. Evidently they did not.

Romanian President Nicușor Dan condemned the attack and promised a "firm response at the national, allied, and international levels" saying that “Romania is a NATO member state and will under no circumstances allow Russian aggression to spread to its citizens.”

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Support for Reintegration Grows in Transnistria

Journalists with Zona de Securitate partnered with the think tank Watchdog to conduct a study on the perceptions of the residents of the Transnistria region. The most interesting outcome was for their question:

“If a referendum were held next Sunday (you were asked to vote) on the reintegration of Transnistria with the Republic of Moldova, would you vote for or against integration?”

The results showed more than half of the region’s residents would vote for reintegration with Moldova given the chance. This followed a broader trend of dissatisfaction with the region’s leadership, people reporting that they are “tired” of the unrecognized status of the region and a desire for freedom of speech. When asked about what problems they face in their lives, the most common response was “the unrecognized status of the Transnistria region” which was selected by 38% of the respondents. That beat out “low salaries / low pensions” which came in at 37.5%. Both numbers rose since 2025.

Polling, journalism and freedom of expression are prohibited in Transnistria so these numbers come with some caveats. The study was conducted via an online survey which was “cross-checked” via a series of focus groups. The authors stress that these results are unweighted and that as such “the opinion of women and young people in the region is under-represented.”

Even with these caveats, the study shows real movement over time and attests to a directional change in the region in favor of Moldova and against Moscow.

5 More Transnistrian “Officials” Lose Their Moldovan Citizenship

President Sandu stripped 5 people resident in Transnistria of their citizenship. No official reason was published, but Zona de Securitate reports that they are employees of the MGB (former KGB).

This is the latest in a series of such moves to strip regional “officials” involved in human rights abuses of their Moldovan passports. Former Deputy Prime Minister for Reintegration Alexandru Flenchea recently speculated that these moves are the proximate cause of Russia’s recent threats against Moldova - including offers of expedited Russian citizenship and threats of military force. He stated:

“Here Moscow probably doesn’t fully understand what Chisinau is after by withdrawing citizenship, because what interests them is the action against the Russian military. Why is Chisinau punishing them? It’s a signal. It’s a signal that Chisinau wants to do what? And because they don’t know exactly what, just in case, they are warning Chisinau through direct threats,”

International Affairs

Here’s a roundup of the top international affairs stories of the week:

• President Sandu attended the GLOBESEC Forum in Prague. There she was presented the GLOBESEC Award for “her commitment to defending democracy under pressure and her role in anchoring Moldova’s future in stability and reforms.”

• Foriegn Minister Mihai Popșoi visited Beijing. In meetings with his counterpart, Minister Popșoi spoke of cooperation in the area of culture and tourism. Specifically, he announced an interest from Chisinau in establishing direct flights to Beijing, and discussed including Moldova on China’s “Approved Destination Status (ADS)” list. Countries on the ADS list are approved destinations for Chinese tourists and Moldova’s inclusion would allow tour agencies to organize group tours to the country2.

• US Senator Mark Kelly traveled to Chisinau and met with President Sandu. They discussed Moldova’s resilience against hybrid attacks and President Sandu thanked the United States for the recent announcement of $8 million dollars of cybersecurity support over the next 4 years.

• Igor Dodon announced that he will travel with a Socialist Party delegation to the Saint Petersburg Economic Forum in June. He made the announcement with Russia’s ambassador delegate posing in front of a photo of Putin. On his way, Dodon stopped in Belarus and met with Alexander Lukashenko who warned Moldova against giving up its sovereignty and turning its back on traditional friends.

Major New Sanctions Against Shor’s A7 Network

This week the UK expanded their Regulation 17A Russia sanctions to crypto-asset exchanges. These new sanctions target a broad array of entities facilitating sanctions evasion and supporting Ilan Shor’s A7 group of companies.

Regulation 17A previously applied to sanctioned banks. It is a powerful tool that blocks indirect transactions as well as direct ones. Previously, sanctions against crypto operations only covered direct counterparts, but these new sanctions regulate backwards and forwards assurance as well. Effectively, if funds have ever interacted with a sanctioned entity they remain sanctioned no matter who has them now. The UK is the first country to bring these banking style sanctions into the crypto space.

The most prominent entity that was immediately hit with these sanctions is the crypto exchange HTX. The designation stated:

“The Secretary of State considers that there are reasonable grounds to suspect that HUOBI GLOBAL SA is or has been involved in obtaining a benefit from or supporting the Government of Russia by providing financial services, or making available funds, economic resources, goods or technology, to a person, namely A7 LIMITED LIABILITY COMPANY, which is carrying on business in a sector of strategic significance to the Government of Russia.”

HTX distanced itself from Huobi Global S.A. claiming that the Seychelles based exchange was a distinct entity3.

HTX is one of the largest crypto exchanges in the world with trading volumes surpassing $3.3 billion last year. It is reported to be owned by Chinese crypto-billionaire Justin Sun. The American SEC had previously investigated Sun and his TRON blockchain over allegations of selling unregistered securities, “wash trading,” and market manipulation. They further were investigating allegations of sanctions violations and terrorist financing including Hamas. Sun was previously reported to be avoiding travel to the US for fear of arrest.

In late 2024 Justin Sun invested $75 million into Donald Trump’s World Liberty Financial and soon after all these investigations were dropped. He is now suing World Liberty Financial claiming “extortion” and they have sued him as well.

Other Shor / Hybrid War News

Here’s a roundup of the other top stories of the week:

• Former Bashkan Eugenia Gutsul released an e-book from prison. The book is allegedly comprised of 30 letters she wrote from prison alleging political persecution, complaining about her conditions and more. Titled “The Gutsul Case: Anatomy of Political Persecution” the book got quite a rollout with a special website and downloads in English, Turkish and Russian4.

• The Court of Appeal upheld Gutsul’s conviction. While her lawyers promise to appeal to the Supreme Court of Justice, this effectively confirms her 7 year prison sentence. Gutsul will be transferred from Prison 13 to a women’s penitentiary to continue serving her sentence.

Politics and News

Here are the top political stories of the week:

• Local Public Administration (LPA) reform is progressing. 608 decisions on voluntary mergers have been made as local councils respond to the government’s proposed financial incentives. President Sandu put out a statement on the process encouraging all communities to have an open discussion on the issue and consider mergers. She stated:

“The reform has been put aside for too many years because it is extremely complicated and does not bring either votes or applause. But postponing the reform means depriving our villages of the chance to develop. 87% of the municipalities in Moldova have under 3,000 inhabitants. If we compare the average population per municipality, in Moldova it is 17 times smaller than in Lithuania, for example. Large municipalities are stronger and have the capacity and resources to provide better services to people.“ (...)

“We want developed localities and encourage city halls to unite. The government announced that it will offer three times more money than previously: 3,000 lei for each inhabitant, multiplied by the total number of inhabitants, for localities that voluntarily unite their administrations. The village and local identity are preserved, only the administrations unite ,”

• Mayor Ceban put on a show in parliament. Chisinau’s mayor entered parliament while in session with the apparent goal of making statements protesting LPA reform. After some heated words he attempted to speak from the parliamentary rostrum and was removed after a scuffle with security.

• Moldova will create emergency fuel stockpiles. The parliament passed this law in the first reading. It would mandate fuel stocks of 61 days of consumption of 90 days of net imports. Storage responsibility would be split between a government created or designated “Central Storage Entity” and private sector importers. The law was motivated by the current global oil crisis and aligns Moldova with EU norms.

• Parliament will reduce taxes on renewable energy infrastructure. Customs duties will be dropped to zero for wind turbines (previously 8%) and energy storage (previously 5%). VAT on these imports will still be paid but can be deferred for up to 20 months. These moves follow similar actions for solar panels that are already in effect5. In 2026 Moldova has become a net exporter of renewable energy and storage is now the main need in the sector.

Economics and Infrastructure

Here are the top economic stories of the week:

• The National Bank nor projects 8.1% inflation in 2026. In their announcement they call this “a significant increase compared to the initial forecast, before the conflict in Iran, of approximately 4.7%.” GDP growth is now projected at 2% for the year.

Ending on a High Note

This week the film Fjord won the Palme d’Or trophy at 79th Cannes Film Festival. The film starred Sebastian Stan and was directed by Cristian Mungiu, a Romanian director with Moldovan roots. 15 year old Moldovan actress Vanessa Ceban also played a leading role.

The film explores how a Romanian-Norwegian couple with 5 children adapts to life in an isolated coastal town in Norway.

President Sandu issued her congratulations writing:

“It’s a great joy to see a world-renowned director with Moldovan roots, whose originality and talent create memorable films that touch and inspire audiences across the continent. Mungiu’s films are, above all, a discussion about the values ​​that define us as a society. It is his ability to honestly and boldly raise crucial issues that has once again earned him recognition on the world’s highest filmmaking stage,”

On May 13 a drone entered Moldova near Sauca at 4 pm and flew the length of the country before exiting into Romanian airspace approximately 1 hour later. The drone was spotted and filmed by residents in Balti and in other towns as it flew over. The country’s airspace was temporarily closed while the Army tracked the drone on radar for portions of its flight.

This is now the most extensively tracked and by far the longest drone flight over Moldova of the war. Video filmed from the ground appears to show a Shahed 131 / Geran-1 drone. This model is a kamikaze attack drone that is normally fitted with a warhead, not a model typically used as a decoy.

Moldova’s limited air defense constrain the country’s options for response, but we have recently seen how different countries are approaching drone incursions in very different ways. As we’ve written before, Romania has opted to observe drones and send alerts to people on the ground - but not to shoot them down. This week, a Romanian fighter jet with NATO’s Baltic Air Policing Mission shot down a Ukrainian drone that went off course over Estonia. In Lithuania, a drone entered the airspace from Belarus and headed towards Vilnius - this resulted in the evacuation of the president, prime minister and parliament to bunkers as well as widespread alerts for people to seek shelter.

This drone flight in Moldova, which passed over major population centers, has highlighted Moldova’s passive response - where the army confirms after the fact whether (or not) they detected it at all.

Putin, Russian Citizens and Transnistria

On May 14 the Russian Duma passed a bill giving Putin the right to invade foreign countries to protect Russian citizens abroad. According to the Kyiv Independent, this bill allows for military intervention “where Russian citizens face arrest, detention, trial or other perceived persecution by foreign nations and international courts.”

On May 16, Vladimir Putin signed a decree simplifying the process of obtaining Russian citizenship for residents of Transnistria. The proximity of the 2 events led to much online chatter and speculation about potential military intervention in Moldova.

Responding to the news President Sandu said that “they probably need more people to send to the war in Ukraine,” and noted that the 2022 invasion of Ukraine has led to a surge in Transnistrian residents applying for Moldovan citizenship - not Russian.

Valeriu Pasa of Watchdog wrote an excellent analysis of these events as a hybrid action utilizing reflexive control. He noted that the law in question already existed, but previously Putin would have needed approval from Russia’s Federation Council - as if they would have denied it to him. He also noted that anyone and everyone in Transnistria who wanted Russian citizenship got it long ago. The process did not need to be simplified, it was nearly universal before. Finally, Pasa noted that Putin would attack Moldova if he had the opportunity, but that…

“Moldova is protected today not because it “does not frustrate the bear”, but because the Ukrainians shed their blood so as not to let the Russians go any further.”

The purpose of these stories is therefore to create fear. Fear in Moldova of Russian attack. Fear in Armenia ahead of their elections (where this story was amplified as well), fear in Europe to dissuade countries of accepting Moldova into the EU. Russia’s “press” and troll farms amplified the story, then the Western Press spread it uncritically1. That’s reflexive control.

Other Security, Transnistria & Hybrid War News

Here’s a roundup of the other top security stories of the week:

• Austria expels Russian diplomats over rooftop antennas presumed to be used for spying. Euronews reports an investigation showing a growing network of electronic installations on the roofs of Russian diplomatic posts across Europe. This mirrors a story covered by Moldova Matters in 2023 about Russia’s spies and antennas in Chisinau - proving once again that hybrid operations that are tested in Moldova, Ukraine, Armenia, Georgia and elsewhere ultimately are brought to EU countries.

• Transnistria has created a “Together” Social Support Fund and is gathering donations to pay salaries and pensions and to fund social services. This was reported by Zona de Securitate who note that funds here will not only pay pensions - but also the salaries of soldiers and the security services. Sheriff Holding quickly contributed 100 million Transnistrian rubbles (around €5 million euros) to the fund. At the same time the region extended their Economic State of Emergency another month.

• Mass disinformation campaign about an alleged scheme to “replace the Moldovan people” with 300,000 foreigners. The campaign alleges that Moldova plans to import these foreigners, called “uncontrolled criminals” from Asia, and give them free food and housing. It was amplified by disgraced journalist Natalia Morari as well as pro-Russian politicians like Irina Vlah and Victoria Furtuna. The “great replacement” themed campaign had a clear racial tinge as Morari and others spoke about how South Asians with large families will become the majority in only 8 years. The Russian campaign appears to have been launched opportunistically based on recent comments by Minister of Economy Eugeniu Osmochescu who stated that Moldova needs an additional 300,000 active workers in order to reach EU productivity levels. He did mention targeted immigration in these comments, but mostly focused on the need to mobilize workers from the approximately 1 million people in Moldova (largely aged 25 - 45) who are not officially employed2.

• The Matryoshka network and other election interference tools tested in Moldova have been deployed against Armenia. Russian propaganda stresses that a re-election of Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan will mean war. The campaign of interference includes operations very similar to those used in Moldova - but more of them. This campaign began 243 days before the elections and has saturated Armenia’s information space for most of the last year.

• Armenia’s “fact investigation platform” fip reported details on Russia’s hybrid campaigns across Europe. fip’s reporting was based on a document dump, presumably hacked and released to them3, detailing operations within Russia’s Social Design Agency (SDA). This Orwellian sounding agency is responsible for Russia’s external propaganda and disinformation operations as well as active kinetic hybrid attacks and operates under First Deputy Chief of Staff of the Presidential Executive Office of Russia, Sergei Kiriyenko. fip’s investigation is worth reading in full as it details past and future operations against Armenia, France, Ukraine, Germany, Moldova, Finland and Norway. The report found that disinformation targeting EU countries was meant to dissuade leadership and the public at large from accepting Moldova and Ukraine into the bloc. fip wrote that “Significant efforts were made to discredit Ukrainian President Zelenskyy, Armenian Prime Minister Pashinyan, and Moldovan President Sandu.” The report also produced text messages where former Romanian MP Sebastian Ghiță negotiated with Kremlin handlers fees for information operations that his network of TV channels could conduct in order to discredit Maia Sandu and PAS. The apparent Kremlin agent is wanted in Romania on numerous corruption related charges and is currently a fugitive in Serbia.

President Sandu Awarded the “European Order of Merit”

Established in May 2025 on the 75th anniversary of the Schuman Declaration, the European Order of Merit recognizes people for their “significant contribution to European integration and the promotion of EU values.” President Sandu was picked among the first group of recipients and received the award in Strasbourg this week.

Speaking in Strasbourg, President Sandu stated:

“Thank you for the European Order of Merit. Receiving it alongside leaders who have shaped this continent, built on the idea that Europeans are stronger together, is an honor.”

But if we are to measure merit, then this distinction belongs to the people of Moldova. They are the ones who earned it. For three decades, Moldovans have built their European future, overcoming a difficult economic transition, taking to the streets when democracy was in danger, resisting when oligarchs tried to conquer the state, and voting for Europe again and again in the face of Russian threats and blackmail. This is merit.”

She went on to speak of the merit of Moldova’s civil servants, journalists, police, engineers, policymakers, entrepreneurs and judges who are leading the country’s “dramatic shift towards Europe” and fighting for the nation’s democratic resilience in the face of Russian pressure.

The European Order of Merit is given in 3 classes - Distinguished Members, Honourable Members and Members. In 2026 Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Angela Merkel were among the Distinguished Members, President Sandu was among the Honourable Members and humanitarian José Andrés among the Members.

Heckling and Standing Ovations

Cristian Rizea was removed from the hall by security after yelling “Maia Sandu is a dictator” during her speech. Except for this notable interruption, President Sandu got a standing ovation at the event.

So who is Cristian Rizea? At this event he claimed to be a Romanian journalist and apparently was accredited as such. He is not a journalist and his accreditation does not reflect well on the European Parliament. Rizea is a criminal, conspiracist and buffoonish attention seeker. He was indicted for a spectacular array of corruption offenses in Romania dating from his brief stint as an MP there. He then fled to Moldova and managed to resist extradition for some years before being expelled from the country in 2023 and placed in jail. Apparently he was let out on house arrest last summer and is back to his old games.

Back in 2021 I wrote an article explaining my editorial choices and what makes the cut for Moldova Matters and what doesn’t. I focused a whole section of that article on Rizea as an example of news that was often hilarious but not really important. The personality type that combines kleptomania with the desperate need to always be on TV is bound to create spectacle. This time he managed to actually make the cut thanks to the apparently lax security at the European Parliament.

Inconclusive Local Elections

On May 17 Taraclia and Orhei had early local elections for mayor. Both towns’ mayors were part of the Shor network and resigned in December when Ilan Shor announced that he was withdrawing his projects and candidate support in Moldova. In Orhei the Supreme Court of Justice issued a last minute ruling upholding the Central Election Commission’s (CEC)’s decision to remove PPDA candidate Victor Perțu from the ballot. The CEC had found that Perțu remained part of the Shor network and sought to camouflage this by moving to PPDA.

Neither race was conclusive and both will move to a runoff election. In Taraclia independent candidate Alexandr Borimecicov (31% first round vote) will face off against Socialist Ecaterina Iacobceac (28%). The PAS candidate came in 3rd with 15%. Leading candidate Alexandr Borimecicov has reported almost zero campaign financing - either income or expenses. At the same time he is running a number of paid facebook ad campaigns promoting his campaign promise to pay for just about every problem the city faces with unspecified external grant funding.

In Orhei, independent candidate Ramiz Ansarov (23.14% first round) will face off against Sergiu Aga (19.53%) of the League of Cities and Communes. Sergiu Aga is a Priest who is well known for blending civic and spiritual pursuits. He currently runs a “Christian Philanthropy” organization, serves as a municipal counselor and as a district counselor.

We’ll come back with updates on these elections and what the results say about how these 2 primary seats of the Shor network’s political power are (or aren’t) moving on.

Other Politics & News

Here’s a roundup of the other top political stories of the week:

• Moldova hosted the 135th Ministerial Session of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe. The Chisinau gathering brought together 50 delegations from member states as well as 20 foreign ministers. It marked the conclusion of Moldova’s rotating presidency of the Committee of Ministers. At the event, 34 member states, including Moldova, backed an agreement on the creation of a “Management Committee of the Special Tribunal for the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine.” President Sandu spoke at the event saying that “Russia is the most pressing and severe threat to the security of our continent today and, probably, for the coming decades.”

• Scandal around a shooting at an army base in Cahul. Initial reports stated that a 20 year old contract soldier improperly handling a Glock pistol shot an 18 year old contract soldier and that a 16 year old who was visiting the 18 year old subsequently died of cardiac arrest. Later it was found that the 16 year old had also been shot with the same bullet and died of the gunshot wound. The shooter is in detention and multiple investigations have been launched. Parliament held closed door meetings on the tragedy and later announced that the soldier broke protocol by bringing the gun into a visitor area and showing it off. They also established that paramedics did not realize the 16 year old was shot because the bullet entered “through the aorta, then into the heart” in such as way as to cause minimal external bleeding. Opposition politicians have called for the Minister of Defense to resign (he won’t), though Renato Usatii has called for more concrete reforms to procedure (such as locking gun lockers when entering visitor areas). He also visited the shooter in prison and shared the story of how shattered he is.

• PAS turns 10. Maia Sandu and a small team founded the PAS party on May 15 2016. On the 10th anniversary she wrote:

“10 years of resilience and action! On May 15, 2016, the PAS founding congress took place, and we had no idea then how difficult this path would be. But we were united by a strong hope that Moldova could overcome the darkness. When we founded the Action and Solidarity Party (PAS), we had a simple, yet at the time, nearly impossible, goal: to free the country from the corrupt group that had subjugated Moldova, ruled through terror, and completely isolated us from the world. We managed to do it together,”

• Commander Butcher sentenced to 15 years in prison. The NYTimes reports that Neo-Nazi Michail Chkhikvishvili was sentenced to 15 years in prison for his plot to kill Jewish children in NY using poisoned candy. Recall, Michail Chkhikvishvili aka “Commander Butcher” of the Neo-Nazi terror organization the “Cult of Maniac Killers” was arrested in Chisinau in July 2024 after a joint American-Moldovan operation. The activities of his and related groups were later covered by a joint investigation of the Washington Post, Wired, Recorder (Romania) and Der Spiegel (Germany). It’s dark reading and we still have no idea why he was in Chisinau.

• The IMF released updated forecasts for Moldova showing inflation and slowing growth. They now project 8.1% inflation in 2026 and economic growth slowing to 1.5% of GDP. Their final calculations for 2025 showed 7.8% inflation and 2.4% growth. The IMF notes that the downturn of indicators is completely due to the war in Iran and that the situation could become worse depending on how long the crisis carries on.

Ending on a High Note

Literally a high note since we’re talking about Eurovision! Moldova’s Satoshi placed 8th in the Grand Final and was praised for a fun and upbeat song and performance.

Unfortunately, the whole affair landed with a fairly mixed note in Moldova. While the public vote in Moldova awarded the most points to Romania, the national jury gave top points to Poland and Israel. They only gave 3 points to Romania and 0 to Ukraine.

This situation has created a HUGE scandal in Moldova. Former government spokesman Daniel Vodă explained saying that “the jury from the Republic of Moldova seemed not to understand that Eurovision is also a geopolitical contest, not just a musical one.” He went on to explain the scandal saying:

“The problem is that the jury results appear first. And the initial impression was an unfair one: that the Republic of Moldova had turned its back on Romania. That is false. The public voted for Romania. The public saved its honor ,”

Traditionally neighboring countries often support each other and both Romania and Ukraine gave high points to Moldova from their juries. The Romanian Embassy was forced to respond noting no serious damage to diplomatic relations because the “audience’s sincere support speaks louder than any assessment [jury score].”

The scandal did not stay contained online as PAS MP Dinu Plângău called for the resignation of the management of Teleradio-Moldova. The state company did not itself control the jury votes but did organize the jury. Shortly after sitting MPs joined the online calls, Vlad Ţurcanu, CEO of Teleradio-Moldova, resigned. In a statement he noted that his team did not control the jury decision but that he took responsibility as the director of the organization.

Eurovision is no stranger to political controversy, but this is an unusual level of mess. The whole thing made it into the NYTimes as an example of how politics has consumed a song contest. So Moldova looks bad here on both ends - through the “scandal” of the jury vote itself and through the fairly hysterical reaction.

Oh well, the song was fun. Congrats to Bulgaria for their first Eurovision win!!

Today we’re going to unpack what we know so far and look at where this political crisis might be heading.

Who is Irina Gutnic?

Until last week, Irina Gutnic was among the most senior members of Ion Ceban’s City Hall administration and the MAN political party. In October 2022 Mayor Ceban asked Gutnic to join his administration as Deputy Mayor. At that time, Irina Gutnic had just 4 months before become the director of Apă-Canal Chisinau - the capital’s water and sewage utility. She accepted the job as Deputy Mayor but chose not to officially leave Apă-Canal and instead suspended her activity there. This means that she remained the director on paper and had the right to return to her position later.

Her appointment as Deputy Mayor was blocked twice by the municipal council before she was appointed by mayoral order in order to bypass the councilor’s objections. Some in Mayor Ceban’s Socialist Party1 had opposed her appointment, but Councilor Eugenia Ceban, Ion Ceban’s Mother, had rallied support for her. Since becoming Deputy Mayor Irina Gutnic has appeared alongside Mayor Ceban, often seated at his right hand, at nearly all the public events he attends.

While Gutnic’s exact portfolio at City Hall was never publicly defined, her past and recent statements imply that she was heavily involved in administrative coordination, questions around procurement, management of municipal enterprises, emergency commission matters and more. In short she played a major behind-the-scenes role in Mayor Ceban’s administration.

In addition to her job in City Hall, Irina Gutnic was also the leader of the MAN party’s Chisinau territorial organization. For most political parties, the head of the Chisinau territorial organization would be among the most senior. For MAN this is even more true as Chisinau is by far their most important region of support.

In December 2025 TV8’s show “Black Box” reported an investigation into her clothing, wealth and lifestyle. In their exhaustive reporting they identified luxury clothes and shoes owned by the Deputy Mayor worth well over 1 million lei. They also noted the string of new BMW cars that she has parked at her house and compared all of this to her official salary of 27,000 lei / month.

For her part, Irina Gutnic claims that she lives within her budget, owns no cars but has generous friends and family who lend them to her, and that those €950 shoes or €2500 euro dresses are actually just simple clothes custom made for her by her tailor for mere 100s of lei.

Timeline of Events

Before digging into her specific accusations, it is worth briefly outlining the timeline of events here:

• May 11 - Mayor Ceban dismisses Deputy Mayor Irina Gutnic with no reason given.

• May 12 - Apă-Canal Chisinau convenes an Extraordinary General Meeting of Shareholders to terminate her employment there. Apă-Canal Chisinau is structured as a joint stock company that is owned and controlled by the city.

• May 13 - Irina Gutnic gives a press conference with a series of accusations against the mayor casting herself as a whistleblower.

• May 14 - Irina Gutnic submits a complaint to the Anti-Corruption Agency accusing Mayor Ceban of abuse of power in her firing.

• May 14 - Irina Gutnic resigns from the MAN territorial organization.

• May 15 - Irina Gutnic claimed that Ceban’s team tried to intimidate her into resigning on May 11. She claims that they offered her the position at Apă-Canal where “there would be no pressure, no blackmail, and I would just sit quietly there.”

• May 15 - Irina Gutnic gave an extended interview to “Black Box” on TV8 with further accusations against Mayor Ceban.

• May 18 - Mayor Ceban begins making vague claims that this is all a “coup attempt” organized by PAS

• May 19 - Irina Gutnic gives another press conference, alleging that on May 15th her house was broken into in order to gather information on her. She then stated that on May 18th her facebook account was hacked from multiple devices located in foreign countries. She went on to detail more accusations of wrongdoing against Ceban.

…and she doesn’t appear to be done. This story remains alive and Gutnic has clearly indicated that she has more information to share in the future. So what has she said so far?

Whistleblower(?) Accusations Against the Mayor

Former Deputy Mayor Irina Gutnic has had a lot to say about her former boss since her first press conferences on May 13. At that event, she opened by stating that she does “not know exactly what the true reasons for my dismissal were,” claiming that she learned of it from the press. She stressed that her firing was illegal because the process of firing a Deputy Mayor goes through the municipal council. At the same time, Gutnic stated that she offered to resign in January but her resignation was not accepted.

“The decision to go public was not an easy one, but it is an inevitable one, given the decision of the general mayor.”

In her statement she claimed that she would sue over her wrongful termination, not to get her job back but to uphold the law.

Author’s Note: Already there is a lot going on here so look to the footnotes in this section for some analysis starting here2.

Here are some of the claims that Gutnic has made about Mayor Ceban:

• “The “Alternativa” bloc is a camouflaged project.” She claimed that many in the MAN party are sincerely pro-EU and that they were blindsided when Ceban chose to form the Alternative Bloc with obviously pro-Russian political forces. Gutnic claimed that MAN party members were not consulted and that Ceban’s unilateral decisions caused confusion and disillusionment.

• Chisinau City Hall is politicized to support Ceban and the MAN party. “Employees are politically exploited. They are made to work 7 days a week for the personal image of Ion Ceban.” She claimed that City Hall employees, including herself, were sent to campaign for MAN during work hours. She suggested that at times all staff but 1 or 2 people from departments around the city would be sent to campaign - bringing public work to a standstill.

• Ceban funds a network of influencers with public money. Gutnic claims that the anti-PAS anti-Sandu Telegram channel “Casa de Nebuni” (“House of Madmen”) is run by MAN party member Andrei Oțel. And that this channel and others are funded via indirect contracts with the municipal enterprise Autosalubritate (Chisinau’s trash company). She claims to know of 5-7 Telegram channels that are coordinated by City Hall and funded in similar ways. Andrei Oțel denies any connection to this or other Telegram channels. Autosalubritate says it is unaware of such contracts.

• Actions that “go beyond the limits of legality.” Gutnic referenced various actions taken in City Hall that exceeded legal limits or outright broke the law. These allegations are technical and procedural in nature - using non-existent emergency powers to circumvent the city council or other process. The actions taken - road repair, trash removal, etc are not themselves abnormal, but she alleges the process involved abuses.

• Ceban’s connections with Russia. Gutnic referenced Ceban’s Russia connections cryptically saying:

“Regarding relations with the Russian Federation, we will come back with more details, but given Axerov’s [Nidjat Askerov] presence in Chișinău City Hall, things speak for themselves. He appears in the conviction decision of Dan Cuclescu [Denis Cuculescu] in the treason case.”

This statement references Denis Cuculescu’s treason conviction earlier this year. In that trial various witnesses connected him to the FSB and to Nidjat Askerov (subject of a parallel trial) and him to Ceban and Dodon. Gutnic implies that she knows more about this connection as a City Hall insider but does not elaborate3.

Serious Claims, Missing Substance

This is only a sampling of some of the most serious claims that Irina Gutnic has been making. Many claims, such as those about Ceban’s connections to Russia are really teasers - letting people know that she has more to say. Others are simply very personal - she claims that Ceban is a tyrant, that everyone in city hall is terrified of him, that he is a danger to Chisinau and Moldova as a whole, etc.

In Moldova, the public element of political scandals such as this one is usually only the tip of the iceberg. It is possible that Irina Gutnic has a lot to say and simply wants to drag it out over a few news cycles. It is also possible that she is calibrating her statements to cause damage but also imply that she has much more - presumably be in service of negotiating a deal behind the scenes.

We’ll have to wait and see how this plays out.

The Primaria’s Response

Initially Mayor Ceban tried to avoid responding to the accusations saying:

“We are not going to respond to a lady who is angry that she no longer has a position and who came out to vent all this anger in public. I personally announced her resignation.”

At the same time, he also vaguely insinuated that Irina Gutnic was being controlled by outside forces - claiming that she is friends with former PAS party member Andrei Spînu.

By May 18 however the response got more forceful and had a new (if not clearer) narrative. Ceban stated that “They were planning a coup attempt within the Chisinau City Hall” and that “they” apparently is PAS. He stated that this whole thing has been orchestrated to force his resignation and said that Irina Gutnic had been wearing a wire and recording all conversations in the building. He provided no evidence for these statements.

Other MAN party members pushed back as well with MP Gaik Vartanyan downplaying the seniority of her role by saying that she was in no position to be privy to the decisions on creating the Alternative Bloc4.

Chisinau Deputy Mayor Victor Pruteanu highlighted some of the contradictions in her statements saying:

“If things were so bad, then why did she remain silent for so many years? And if she hadn’t been fired, would she have continued to remain silent? Until Monday, Ceban posed no threat to Chisinau, and now suddenly he does?5”

How Significant is All of This?

Very. Ion Ceban’s political project relies on a few key pillars:

1. Technocratic competence - They repair the streets, renovate the sidewalks, reconstruct parks and make sure the buses run on time. Even Mayor Ceban’s sharpest critics usually agree that Chisinau has improved during his terms.

2. Pragmatic pro-EU stances - Ceban and the MAN party claim to support Moldova joining the EU. The “pragmatic” part generally means that they also promise better relations with Russia.

3. Being a safe alternative to PAS - it’s right there in the name “National Alternative Movement” (MAN) and Alternative Bloc.

Parts 2 & 3 of the formula largely unraveled over the course of 2025. Ion Ceban as a pro-EU politician was never believable for close watchers of Moldovan politics. His choice to create the Alternative Bloc with a who’s who of the most well known pro-Russian politicians in Moldova further undermined this claim for anyone paying attention. Though most voters probably never read Alternative’s electoral program6, most seemed not to buy the pro-EU story or that they were a real pro-EU “alternative.” In these areas Irina Gutnic’s allegations show that at least some people within MAN were having their own doubts about the pro-EU direction of the party.

More importantly though, her allegations directly attack point 1 - technocracy and competence. Gutnic paints a picture of a city government fully co-opted to burnish the political image of one man. They campaign for him while taxpayers fund their salaries, close down public services when he needs them to fill out rallies and break the law when he tells them to. Most damaging of all - she alleges that online influencers and channels set up to attack Moldova’s president and government are being paid out of tax revenues meant to support trash pickup. If these allegations are true - in whole or in part - they threaten to shatter Mayor Ceban’s image as a hard working public servant only focused on city problems.

At this stage Irina Gutnic’s allegations are just that. It is possible that they will lead to criminal investigations but so far they are only words. What makes this significant though is Irina Gutnic herself. For whatever reason, a very senior member of both the city hall administration and the MAN party is airing out dirty laundry. Her position and seniority lends credibility to what she alleges, even if her own history and the odd manner of her firing pose serious questions in their own right.

For now, this story is still developing. We’ll check back with updates as they come.

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Romania Re-enters Political Crisis

On May 5 Romania’s government collapsed when the Social Democrats (PSD) withdrew from the governing coalition of Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan and joined George Simion’s AUR party in a vote of no confidence. The collaboration between a center left party like PSD and far-right AUR has caused alarm in Brussels as the “cordon sanitaire” breaks down and cooperation with a far right party brings down a centrist government.

President Nicușor Dan called for calm stating:

“It is not a happy moment in any democracy. However, it is a democratic decision of the parliament. I call for calm. Romania is a stable state, the state institutions are functioning and Romania has a direction that it is following. There is consensus among the pro-Western parties on the major directions of Romania (...)
We will have a government within a reasonable time, I exclude the scenario of early elections and, I emphasize, at the end of the negotiations, we will have a pro-Western government. (…)
“With calm, we will get through this,”

Meanwhile, George Simion declared that AUR is willing to enter government.

Next there will likely be a protracted series of consultations and negotiations as Romania seeks a stable governing majority.

Romanian MEP Siegfried Mureșan, a major voice in support of Moldova in the European Parliament, spoke of how this turn of events could negatively impact Moldova. He noted that if there is a weak prime minister, then there will still be public support but that “bilateral projects will remain on paper and drag on.” On the possibility of the far right entering government, he went on to warn:

“A prime minister who acts like a puppet, calling himself pro-European but dependent on the anti-European PSD-AUR majority, will not enjoy the trust of Europe. This, unfortunately, will also affect the Republic of Moldova. If the prime minister in Bucharest does not have the trust of the EU, he will not be able to achieve results for Moldova. (…) If Romania has a prime minister who lacks trust, that will be bad news for Moldova as well,”

In April last year I took stock of what challenges Moldova could face if George Simion or AUR came to power in Romania. Here’s a link to that article:

International Affairs News

Here’s a roundup of the other top international affairs stories of the week:

• President Sandu attended the European Political Community (EPC) Summit in Yerevan. President Sandu traveled to the event with Romanian President Nicușor Dan and in addition to the summit and bilateral meetings met with leaders of EU countries on the topic of Moldova’s accession. This meeting included Nicușor Dan, French President Emmanuel Macron, Italian PM Giorgia Meloni, British PM Keir Starmer, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and others. While no official readout was given, Romanian President Dan later stated that they anticipate an answer by the end of June on opening negotiating clusters with Moldova. The delay comes as EU leaders discuss Ukraine’s EU bid with Hungary’s new government.

• More talk of Union with Romania - in the foreign press. In an interview with Le Monde, President Sandu reiterated her past comments on The Rest is Politics Podcast that joining with Romania would be a faster way to enter the EU. She went on to note that there is no public consensus for this, citing 40% support in Moldova1. Romanian President Nicușor Dan was asked about these comments while on a visit to Croatia and replied citing a 2018 vote in Romania’s parliament that indicated openness to union if Moldova wanted it. Also this week, a recent poll showed that 7 in 10 Romanians would support union with Moldova.

• Moldovan Flag Day celebrated in Chicago. Moldova’s flag was raised in the heart of Chicago as the country’s new consulate celebrated the April 27 holiday with State Senators, county officials and members of the diaspora. The event celebrated Moldova’s connections to the local community and the growing and successful diaspora in the United States writ large.

Political Updates

Here’s a roundup of the top politics news of the week:

• Parliament votes a new governing regulation in the first reading. The law restructures parliamentary procedure with a few notable changes. Firstly, it seeks to lock in the political configuration of parliament by cracking down on “political tourism.” MPs who leave their parliamentary faction would no longer be allowed to join a new faction or represent a party that was not elected to parliament in the last election. This does not prevent MPs from leaving their party, but makes it harder to consolidate new groupings as became common in the Plahotniuc era2. The draft regulation also defines Romanian as the working language of parliament and would stop the default translation of legislative projects into Russian - leaving translations as an option “when appropriate.” Opposition MPs claimed that this would prevent them from speaking Russian in parliament (it wouldn’t under the draft law) and walked out in protest. The draft regulation would also allocate schedule time to the opposition every 6th week in an “opposition day” where factions in opposition or independent MPs could add items to the agenda.

• Parliament introduced legislation to impose oversight on the Commission for Emergency Situations (CSE) and update the definition of states of emergency. Under the draft legislation, Parliament’s Committee on National Security, Defense and Public Order will be able to examine “at any time the executive orders issued by the CSE during crisis situations.” They could then submit reports to parliament which would be able to modify or overturn these emergency government decisions. The draft legislation requires the government to submit a report to parliament at the conclusion of a state of emergency detailing actions taken under emergency powers and their impact. Finally, the law would make the declaration of a state of emergency more flexible by giving the government the option of declaring one with a duration 30 to 90 days. Currently, states of emergency are fixed at 60 days.

• Alexandru Machidon3 was sworn in a Prosecutor General. He had been acting Prosecutor General since May 2025 and took office officially on April 30 after passing the vetting commission and getting support from the Superior Council of Prosecutors.

• Moldova will lift import duties on a range of American products. 59 MPs voted for the law in the second reading which would exempt most industrial products while retaining protective duties for some agricultural products such as “beef, pork and poultry meat, milk and dairy products, as well as sugar and sugar products.” The stated goal of the legislation is to maintain Moldova’s new 10% tariff rate and “reciprocate” the US lowering tariffs from 25%. As usual with “Liberation Day” none of this is what it seems but I’ll leave that for a footnote4.

• Anti-Corruption prosecutors have announced their decision to appeal the sentence against Vladimir Plahotniuc. They will again seek a 25 year sentence saying that “the punishment imposed does not reflect the seriousness of the acts.” Plahotniuc was previously sentenced to 19 years in prison and is himself appealing.

• Moldova’s Association of Independent Press (API) reported 97 attacks against journalists in 2025. This is the highest number since 2017 and includes bullying, intimidation, hacking of accounts and other threats - both online and offline. Most serious were 12 physical attacks and death threats. Last week we wrote about the strength of Moldova’s independent press… but also the challenges it faces. If you missed it, you can find that article here:

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PPDA and Shor?

Democracy at Home (PPDA)’s candidate for the Orhei Mayor’s election, Victor Perțu, was removed from the race by the Central Election Commission (CEC) for being part of a “camouflaged bloc.” The CEC noted that Victor Perțu was a member of the Shor Party and remained active in the Shor network after the party was declared unconstitutional. Their decision cited an overlap between the Shor network and PPDA and found that Shor candidates were seeking office under a new flag.

This decision provoked outrage among the opposition, including Chisinau Mayor Ion Ceban and Igor Dodon who called the decision political and evidence of a “captured state.” The CEC decision was overturned by the Orhei Court - though the CEC will appeal the decision.

ZdG has made a deep study of events held by Victor Perțu with PPDA leader Vasile Costiuc and found that numerous Shor Party elected officials, activists, defendants in cases of electoral corruption and defendants in cases related to illicit financing and paid protesting, are all present at these events. PPDA claims that the events are open and anyone can come. The story from ZdG is too long to detail here, but is worth reading for those interested.

We’ll be keeping an eye on links between the Shor network and PPDA in the context of this year’s local elections.

Economics & Infrastructure (& Iran)

Here’s a roundup of the top economics / infrastructure / Iran crisis news of the week:

• Fuel prices remain volatile. While diesel prices have begun to fall gasoline prices remain high following the protracted uncertainty of the American-Israeli war against Iran. Compared to pre-war prices diesel is 44.58% more expensive while gasoline is 28.98% more expensive. On May 1 Chisinau increased public transport prices by 17% due to “the current situation of practically doubling the cost of fuel.”

• The Ministry of Finance says food prices increases are “inevitable” due to the global oil crisis. The Ministry said that the government will not look for short term populist solutions but will take “very targeted” actions including support for agriculture via tax refunds and potential support for inter city transit.

• The National Bank (NBM) has increased the base rate from 5% to 6.5%. This was done “out of the need to configure monetary policy in a way that would mitigate pressures on the inflationary process.” NBM now projects annual inflation in 2026 to hit 7%.

• De minimis tax exemptions will end October 1. The Ministry of Finance announced this date when the €150 euro tax free package import regime will be eliminated. In 2025 Moldovans received approximately 10 million packages from Temu, Joom, Aliexpress and others.

• Moldovan Railways are solvent again. Minister of Infrastructure Vladimir Bolea announced that all employees had been fully repaid wage arrears and that the company had eliminated its historical debts by the end of April.

Ending on a High Note

On May 7 the Moldovan pavilion at the 61st Venice Biennale officially opened. The Biennale is an international art and culture exhibition hosted every 2 years in Venice Italy since 18955. This marks the first time Moldova has participated in this event - sometimes called the Olympics of the art world. Moldova’s Minister of Culture Cristian Jardan called the country’s participation in the event a “significant moment for the country's cultural diplomacy.”

Moldova’s exhibit, titled “On the Thousand and Second Night” was created by artist Pavel Brăila and consists of numerous traditional carpets floating between the floor and ceiling supported by drones. It is described as “neither a refuge nor an escape from the ongoing war on life, but a way of making evident the power of imagining other possible exits.”

The exhibit is open to the public and can be visited until November 22, 2026. You can find more information on the official website here.

Today we’re going to start getting caught up on the other critical stories of the last week - but due to the volume of news we’ll split the Weekly Roundup into 2 parts. In Part 1 we’ll look at the biggest stories of the week and in Part 2 we’ll do a roundup of the many smaller - but equally important updates. You’ll have Part 2 in your inbox tomorrow.

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Moldova Participates in Major Prisoner Exchange with Russia / Belarus

On April 28 the news broke that Moldova was a participant in a high level prisoner swap involving the intelligence agencies of 7 countries. Five prisoners “convicted” of espionage by Russia or Belarus were swapped for 5 persons held by EU countries and Moldova. While much of the news focused on the prominent Polish-Belarusian opposition journalist Andrzej Poczobut who was freed in the exchange, Moldova was notable for being responsible for 4 of the 10 prisoners exchanged - trading 2 and getting 2 back.

Two agents of Moldova’s Security and Intelligence Service (SIS) were returned home as part of the swap. In exchange, Moldova freed Belarusian spy Alexander Balan and Nina Popova.

Alexander Balan was the former deputy director of SIS during the Plahotniuc period. He was since arrested in Romania and charged with treason1 on accusations of passing intelligence to Belarus. Nina Popova is the wife of a Russian soldier serving in Russian army formations in Transnistria who was sentenced to 1 year in prison in October 2025 for attempting to bribe a border guard. After flying from Istanbul to Chisinau she was told that the was banned from entering the country, after which she attempted to slip the customs officer $300 in her passport and was arrested.

Upon his arrival, Belarus welcomed Alexander Balan with flowers from members of the State Security Committee of Belarus. State media celebrated the return of “Belarusian spies Alexander Balan and Vladislav Nadeiko.”

Russia’s state news agency TASS published video of Moldova’s SIS operatives being led by FSB agents to the exchange.

SIS Director Alexandru Musteață commented on the return of the men saying:

“Our officers, two young, dedicated and patriotic officers, went there on a secret mission, the details of which I cannot confirm or provide. Unfortunately, the mission failed, they were captured, which is why we have an internal investigation and an internal assessment of this fact. We started it the moment they (SIS officers, no.) were captured. We started the internal investigation from the beginning. We have completed 99% of the entire assessment. What remains are their statements. Now that they are home, they are safe, my colleagues will talk to them to create the picture - what happened that this operation failed and we will make a decision”

He noted that the 2 men were undergoing medical checks and will return to service in a non-clandestine role.

Commenting on the exchange President Sandu stated:

“It was a complicated operation, we had the support of the institutions of the United States, Romania, Poland. A lot of work was done, there were many risks and I repeat, I am glad that in the end we managed to make this exchange and that these two citizens of the Republic of Moldova, people of good faith, loyal to our state, are home safely and I hope that their health is also good. They are going to undergo some tests to make sure that everything is fine,”

On May 10, President Trump posted on Truth Social about the exchange writing

“We have just secured the release of three Polish citizens and two Moldovans from Belarusian and Russian detention. Thanks to my special presidential envoy, John Coale, we were able to exert serious pressure for this release to take place.

My friend, the President of Poland, Karol Nawrocki, met with me last September and asked me to help release Andrzej Poczobut from a Belarusian prison. Today, Poczobut is free thanks to our efforts.

The United States stands with its allies and friends. I thank President Aleksandr Lukashenko for his cooperation and friendship,”

Analysis of the Prisoner Exchange

According to reporting this operation was incredibly complex and involved coordination among multiple Western intelligence services. Alexander Balan was released by Romania while still pending trial into Moldovan custody so that he could plead guilty and be pardoned (for crimes in Moldova) prior to being repatriated to Belarus. American Special Envoy John Coale apparently helped coordinate the effort alongside the intelligence agencies of US allies and Moldova. This is the first time that Moldova participated at an organizational level in a coordinated effort of this kind, and it marks a clear signal that Moldova’s intelligence agencies are operating closely with partners in complex operations.

While it is unlikely that Russia would have ever dealt bilaterally with Moldova on an issue like this, it is notable that Moldova’s release of 2 of the 5 prisoners held in the West was a key enabler of the broader operation. Most importantly, the Moldovan authorities were able to bring the 2 SIS operatives home safely.

Sheriff’s German Companies

RISE Moldova reported on a network of German companies owned by the Sheriff corporation and its founder Viktor Gushan. The network of companies came to light after Der Spiegel reported millions of euros of tax evasion by 2 media companies - Kartina Digital GmbH and Kartina TV - both with connections to Sheriff Holding.

These companies, which provide Russian language TV streaming services, were part of a large network uncovered by RISE including companies trading in textiles, real estate, media, advertising, software development and more. Kartina Digital GmbH alone was found to have underpaid taxes by €39 million euros in the years 2010 - 2019. The company is also involved in an ongoing lawsuit in the United States with American company Actava, which is seeking $25 million in damages for fraud and breach of contract.

Gushan’s TV stations promised 200 Eastern European channels in a streaming package targeting Russian speakers in Germany, the US, Israel, Canada and other parts of Western Europe. Previous investigations have shown that some of these stations broadcast AfD political advertisements for Russian speakers in Germany.

The investigation by RISE is a reminder that while Viktor Gushan controls almost the whole economy of Transnistria, and is alleged to control much of the region’s “government,” he has not yet been sanctioned by Western government for the political oppression or human rights abuses endemic in the region.

Other Transnistria Updates

Here are the other important Transnistria related updates of the week:

• Ukraine is strengthening their defensive lines on the Transnistrian border. Ukraine’s local commanders posted pictures of the new lines and noted that they…

“will allow the construction of a staggered defense system, capable of promptly reacting to any provocations or obvious manifestations of aggressive actions from the self-proclaimed unrecognized satellite of the Russian Federation”

• Transnistrian “President” Vadim Krasnoselsky commented on the increasingly threatening rhetoric from Russia. His comments follow Russian media and diplomatic sources alleging that Moldova is considering a military resolution to the conflict and threatening responses. Krasnoselsky responded to this saying:

“I still believe in prudence and common sense. No matter how complicated our relations may be, I still believe Moldovan politicians. I believe that they are telling the truth and that they are opposed to a forceful solution to the Transnistrian issue. Of course, there are many nuances: Moldova’s armament, and the special units participating in NATO programs. But that aside, I believe the Madam President when she says she does not want to resolve the Transnistrian issue by military means. And for that, unequivocally, of course, we thank them,”

• Parliament passes law imposing taxes on Transnistria. On April 30 parliament passed the law in the final reading which will phase in equal taxes for companies operating in the Transnistrian region. Taxes will first be applied this year to non-essential products such as alcohol, but will then be gradually phased in and cover all products by 2030. In the original draft, the law envisioned adding VAT taxes on natural gas purchases and balancing electricity by June 2026. The final bill pushed this back and allows the government to establish tax rates in these areas starting in August 2026 based on the progress of negotiations - essentially providing the government a tool of economic leverage. Taxes collected under this law will go into the “convergence fund” and begin funding Moldova’s broader strategy of convergence. Transnistria’s Supreme Soviet sent an official letter of protest to Speaker of Parliament Grosu objecting to the law as taxation without representation2 and highlighting how new taxes will further damage the already crippled regional economy.

Proekt Reports Abramovich is A7’s “Krisha”

Investigative journalists at the Russian outlet Proekt (“Project”) released an investigation into the vast and growing network of payment facilitation companies working to circumvent sanctions against Russia. They showed that all manner of transactions - from facilitating the purchase of Russian gas deliveries to Turkey, to allowing individuals to bypass Bank of America due diligence to buy a Cybertruck, now pass through this opaque network of operators. Proekt reports that the FSB “gets income from each operation” and that Ilan Shor’s A7 companies sit at the center of the web.

Proekt reported that Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich has close links to Shor’s A7 companies and according to their sources serves as the operation’s “krisha and sponsor.” In Russian slang, “krisha” or “roof” is the person or organization under which criminal activity is conducted and protected politically. In this formulation Abramovich is both Shor’s protection, patron and in some sense partner. According to Proekt’s source, Abramovich chose Shor for his ability to “build schemes.”

They further report that when Shor flew to Moscow from Israel in November 2023 he did so on a plane owned by Abramovich and that A7 has offices in multiple buildings owned by the Russian oligarch. Representatives for Abramovich deny these connections and any connections to Shor more generally.

In their reporting, Proekt puts A7 at the center of Russia’s sanctions evasion financial architecture, with their sources claiming that they now have a 15% share of all cross-border financial transactions. The report connected A7 to at least 25 companies under US and EU sanctions - including manufacturers of military drones and armaments.

This reporting is the first to publicly confirm rumors of a connection between Abramovich and Shor. It also highlights how his A7 network continues to grow and facilitate sanctions evasion efforts as well as to help finance Russia’s war efforts.

Europe Day and Victory Day

On May 9 Russia and many countries of the former Soviet Union celebrate “Victory Day” and the end of the second world war (for Russia). This year Moscow did not see any of the normal pomp and circumstance - namely tanks and ballistic missiles on parade in Red Square. Instead the holiday saw a more muted parade held under the shadow of potential Ukrainian drone attack.

In Moldova, this holiday has become a symbol of geopolitical tension, with pro-Russian politicians and activists dressing up in WW2 uniforms and proudly displaying Russian and Soviet military symbols. On the other side people celebrate Europe Day, the European Union’s holiday which marks the end of the war and the transition to peace in a united Europe.

Visiting Chisinau on May 8th, High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Vice-President of the European Commission Kaja Kallas spoke alongside President Sandu and outlined how this holiday is seen in countries formerly occupied by the Soviet Union saying:

“I come from a country where there were different communities and different approaches to May 9th. We discussed why we couldn’t celebrate May 9th as Victory Day. If, after May 9th, when the war ended, Stalin had said: you are free, you can live in freedom and independence, we would also have celebrated that day as Victory Day. But since that was the day the atrocities began for my country, we cannot celebrate May 9th as Victory Day. I’m glad we have different pasts, but we need to focus on a common future, and that’s what Europe Day means,”

On May 9th President of Cyprus Nikos Christodoulides visited Chisinau and hailed Moldova’s progress since June 2022. He stated that “The main objective of the Cyprus Presidency [of the Council of the European Union] remains the official opening of the negotiation chapters starting with cluster no. 1 in June itself.”

Speaking on May 9th to an academic conference of more than 1200 of Moldova’s history teachers, President Sandu spoke to the 2 observances of the same holiday saying:

“Yes, May 9 is Victory Day. We must respect and honor the memory of those who fought and died in World War II. But history didn’t end in 1945. Afterward, a regime began that brought deportations, organized famine, repression, fear, and attempts to suppress our national identity. Therefore, we must not confuse the memory of the war’s victims with the glorification of the Soviet regime. (…) At the same time, it is important to understand that there is no contradiction between Victory Day and Europe Day. The European project emerged as a response to the devastating consequences of war and totalitarianism,”

On Sunday April 26 Moldova’s National Meteorological Service issued a “code orange” for high winds across the country from 10 am until 9 pm. At 2 pm Chisinau Mayor Ion Ceban announced that all outdoor events in the city were cancelled effective immediately and urged all residents to stay home saying:

“We repeatedly call on all residents and visitors of the capital to stay sheltered unless there is an urgent necessity to go out.”

This cut short the Chisinau marathon that was organized in the city center as well as other planned events. High winds impacted communities all around Moldova with 92 communities experiencing power outages and downed trees blocking roads and damaging cars all across the country.

In Chisinau, a 66 year old woman was injured after being hit by a billboard that blew off its mount and a 6 year old child sustained serious injuries after being hit by a falling tree branch at the Chisinau Zoo. The child is in intensive care.

In addition to falling trees, numerous cars were damaged by falling roof tiles blown off of apartment and house roofs onto parking below.

President Sandu Commemorates 40th Anniversary of the Chernobyl Disaster

President Sandu traveled to Kyiv on April 26 to join President Zelenskyy in commemorating the 40th anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster. In her remarks at the event she called attention to the lies the underpinned the disaster and praised the work of the international community who helped build the new containment system. The President stated:

“A Soviet regime that put its own reputation above people’s lives. That kept people in the dark while a reactor burned out — because the powerful believed they had the right to decide what the powerless were allowed to know.

Over 3,500 Moldovans were among those sent here as liquidators1. Many of them, with insufficient protection and without knowing the whole truth. They were asked to be brave in the name of a system that did not return this courage with honesty. Moldova commemorates them today. (…)

This evidence matters more than ever. Because the contempt that caused this disaster has not disappeared.

The same lack of respect for human life that defined the Soviet reaction is reflected today in Russia’s attacks on Ukrainian cities, in the occupation of nuclear power plants, in the war that Moscow refuses to even call a war.”

While in Kyiv, President Sandu met with President Zelenskyy and Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko to discuss bilateral cooperation in energy, regional security and EU accession. In a joint press conference she expressed Moldova’s support for Ukraine and called on the EU to “officially open negotiations with Moldova and Ukraine without delay.”

Romania Enters Political Crisis

Romania’s Social Democratic Party (PSD) reigned from the coalition government of Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan and has announced a coming vote of no confidence with the support of George Simion’s AUR party. Prime Minister Bolojan has stated that he does not plan to step down and will send a new list of ministerial candidates from the now minority government to President Nicușor Dan.

Together, PSD and AUR have 219 of 463 seats in parliament, short of the 233 needed for a majority or to oust the government. They are whipping votes and seeking to attract members of the SOS Romania, POT and PACE opposition parties (41 votes) or the 22 independents. The remaining coalition of PNL, USR and UDMR control 164 seats.

The move has set off alarm bells across Europe as a major Social Democratic Party is making common cause with the far right. PSD Senator Victoria Stoiciu, originally from Moldova, resigned from the party when the news was announced saying:

“I believe that an absolute cordon sanitaire is needed to keep extremist forces in total political isolation. Any violation of this principle is not just a tactical error, but a normalization of fascism. Step by step, until the monster is too big to be killed.” (...)

“I cannot and will never support the normalization of fascism. It is a red line that cannot be crossed.“

Internally the alliance of PSD and AUR is a major challenge to President Nicușor Dan and threatens to further upset Romania’s complicated political balance of power. For Moldova, any actions that bring AUR into the mainstream threaten the bilateral relationship between the PAS government and Romania. We’ll watch this story closely in the weeks to come.

Security Updates

Here’s a roundup of the top security related news of the week:

• Sergei Shoigu, secretary of the Russian Security Council, threatened Moldova over the alleged mistreatment of Russian citizens. After the Russian Duma passed a bill giving the president authority to militarily intervene whenever a Russian citizen is threatened in a foreign country, Shoigu gave an interview where he claimed that the 220,000 Russian citizens living in Transnistria “are now threatened due to the reckless and irresponsible actions of Kiev (sic) and Chisinau.” When discussing options to protect them he stressed that “Russia will take all measures and use all available methods” adding that “Nothing should be ruled out2.” Moldova’s Ministry of Foriegn Affairs as well as the EU issued statements affirming support for a peaceful resolution of the Transnistrian issue and affirming Moldova’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

• Russian drone crashes in populated area in Galati. On April 25 Romanian military command stated that British Eurofighter Typhoons were scrambled with authorization to shoot down detected incoming drones in Romanian airspace. One drone crashed in Galati near the annex of a house resulting in the evacuation of 535 local residents and the disconnection of gas to 20 streets. No one was hurt and the drone was removed and detonated in a controlled explosion. The same night the wreckage of a second drone was found in Romanian territory near the border with Ukraine. Responding to the news, President Nicusor Dan stated:

“I strongly condemn Russia’s irresponsible behavior. Incidents like the drone that crashed last night in Galati demonstrate disrespect for international law and threaten the safety of the citizens of Romania, a NATO member state. Romania is not a party to this conflict. Yet, its consequences are felt on our streets, in our homes, and in our lives. This is the first time Romanian property has been actually damaged—a point we take very seriously,”

• A “drone like object” was found crashed on the roof of a Chisinau apartment building. It was found in the early morning of April 28 by a resident and resulted in the evacuation the of the building as police examined the crash. Police have since clarified that no explosives were found and that the components of the drone are being examined. No additional information is available at this time.

• Former director of Moldova’s Security and Intelligence Service (SIS) Alexandru Balan was extradited to Moldova on April 24. He will begin serving his 1.5 year prison sentence for the disclosure of state secrets. Balan is also on trial in Romania on charges of treason and allegations that he was passing secrets to the Belarusian KGB. There has been much speculation about why he would be extradited to serve a minor sentence while facing much more serious charges in Romania. Balan pled guilty to the charges in Moldova and is apparently doing the same in Romania. Balan was reported to have been sending hidden notes and making covert phone calls to persons in Moldova saying that his situation “must be raised at a political level.” Reportedly, he was attempting to reach out to Moldovan MP Renato Usatîi. At the same time, a source from Romanian specialized police DIICOT told local outlet HotNews that…

“Given the functions he held, this man also crossed paths with other intelligence structures from other states. He probably has some information and since he expressed his desire to collaborate with the authorities, it can be used. It’s also about pragmatism in such cases. I don’t think there’s a problem with DIICOT losing an important defendant,”

**Update: Immediately before publication it was announced that Alexandru Balan was pardoned and exchanged for 2 Moldovan Security and Intelligence (SIS) officers who were being held by Russia. President Sandu’s office stated:

"In order to be able to bring you (the SIS officers) home, following a complex operation, the 2 officers were exchanged, as requested by the other side, with two other people: a citizen of the Russian Federation, Popova Nina, who was acting against the state of the Republic of Moldova, and Alexandru Bălan, a citizen of the Republic of Moldova, accused of treason in the interests of the KGB in Belarus, who was pardoned in order to be able to leave for Belarus," (…)

“it is a gain that cannot be measured by a simple mathematical equation - we brought home two citizens who work for the Republic of Moldova, giving up, in return, 2 prisoners who worked against the Republic of Moldova."

This operation has been in the works for several months and was coordinated by SIS with the support of the United States, Poland and Romania. President Sandu thanked President Donald Trump "for his involvement and that of the US administration in the success of this action."

We’ll return with more updates on this breaking story in future roundups.

Political Updates

Here’s a roundup of the top political stories of the week:

• The State of Emergency in the energy sector has ended. Parliament voted on April 25 to end the emergency early but to maintain a State of Alert for an additional 60 days. They cited the success in repairing the damaged high voltage line and noted that actions had been taken to “maintain the functionality of the oil market in crisis conditions” and prevent major disruptions.

• An investigation from DIEZ spotlighted a thriving (and public) market for educational fraud. In their investigation, journalists from DIEZ found numerous companies and web advertisements offering services writing undergraduate and graduate thesis for as little as 7500 lei. Many of these services operated public websites and accepted payments via the MIA payments system. After posing as interested students and getting invoices for the offered work, DIEZ journalists sent 1 leu to the accounts indicated in order to get the names of the persons owning them. In one case, they found that a service was run by Ala Mușchei, former candidate for the Democracy at Home (PPDA) party in last parliamentary elections. She had been 84th on the party list and listed her profession as an “text editor.” Minister of Education Dan Perciun responded by saying that there would be zero tolerance for academic fraud. He stated that new software, already purchased, would be used to check thesis starting this year and that the ministry was reviewing legal options. Parliament has since announced hearings on thesis buying with relevant state agencies as well as law enforcement.

• Natalie Portman’s parents visited Telenesti on April 20 for Easter of the Dead. Portman’s grandmother was originally from Telenesti. The family later moved to Chisinau before emigrating to Israel in 1978. Portman’s parents Avner Hershlag and Shelley Stevens visited family graves and met with local mayor Vadim Lelik and discussed the town’s ties with the diaspora.

Shor / Hybrid War Updates

Here are the latest stories in Russia’s hybrid war against Moldova:

• Convictions in electoral corruption cases continue. This week the court convicted 5 Pobeda (Victory) party leaders and activists for bribing voters in the 2024 referendum - issuing fines of 45,000 to 50,000 lei. In a separate case, the presidents of the Ungheni and Rezina Shor Party organizations were sentenced to prison time after being convicted of illicit party financing. Cases like this continue to roll in month after month as the authorities bring cases to court and individuals in the Shor network are held accountable.

• New arrest warrant issued for Ilan Shor. Prosecutors have issued an arrest warrant related to a case of Shor’s role as an “organizer of illegal financing of political parties.” This case relates to the 2023 bombshell undercover investigation where politician Arina Spătaru (aka Arina 007) cooperated with prosecutors as Shor recruited her and others to create a new “pro-European” political party that would be captive to his network. A new extradition request for Shor has been sent to Russia. Commenting on the news, Arina Spătaru stated:

“In 2023, I participated in this investigation as an undercover agent. I didn’t take any money from Shor—not then, nor since. I did it because I believe Moldova must rid itself of political corruption and the influence of criminal groups. Three years later, I see that things are moving forward. Slower than they should, but they are moving forward,”

• Igor Chaika has been named the new head of Rossotrudnichestvo. Chaika has been sanctioned by the US, EU, UK and Canada over his role in the Kremlin’s attempts to destabilize Moldova. He has been a key behind the scenes player in organizing Kremlin support for the Shor network, the Socialist Party and as the owner of many blocked TV stations in Moldova. Rossotrudnichestvo is officially tasked with administering foreign aid and cultural exchanges for the Russian Federation. It operates like a state run version of Shor’s Evrazia NGO - utilizing soft power to forward Kremlin foreign policy and security objectives.

On the Sunday and Monday following Orthodox Easter Moldovans gather in the graveyards to commemorate a very Moldovan holiday, “Paștele Blajinilor,” often translated as Easter of the Dead. On this day Moldovans remember those who came before and gather in the graveyard for a picnic where they symbolically share food and wine with their lost relatives.

On the occasion, President Sandu put out Easter wishes writing:

“On Easter, we give ourselves the time to return to what really matters: our roots, our family, and the invisible thread that connects generations. Let us turn our thoughts these days to those who gave meaning to our path and who remain part of us, through everything they left us. And let us find in the moments spent with our loved ones, in peace and gratitude, the reconciliation we need and the strength to move forward,”

This is the last event of Moldova’s long Easter season - stretching from lent fasting through Catholic and Orthodox Easter and on to this very local commemoration. If you’d like to read more about Easter of the Dead we published a guest essay on the topic back in April 2024 which you can read here:

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Politics & News

Here are the top stories of the week:

• The Alternative Bloc and Faction continue to disintegrate. After Mayor Ceban confusingly announced that his MAN party would withdraw from the Alternative Bloc but remain in the Alternative parliamentary faction - while also loudly distancing itself from that faction - Mark Tkaciuk announced that his Civic Congress party was withdrawing from the parliamentary faction. He said that in a circumstance where MAN loudly distances itself from its partners the only honest move was to break away.

• The Central Election Commission (CEC) submitted plans for revising the electoral code for public consultations. The amendments envision tighter control over social media advertising, including parties declaring all their paid channels and platforms being required to report spending and targeting. The plan pays specific attention to Gagauzia, where the CEC proposes to add additional eligibility criteria for those standing for Bashkan. Specifically, a candidate for Bashkan would be required to speak both Gagauz and Romanian, be at least 35 years old and have lived in the region for at least 1 year. Additionally the amendments would restructure the Central Electoral Council of Gagauzia, reducing the membership from 9 to 7. Two members each would be appointed by the People’s Assembly of Gagauzia, the Executive Committee of Gagauzia and the Comrat Court. One would be appointed by the CEC and the chair and vice chair of the CEC would be permitted to attended Central Electoral Council meetings without voting rights.

• The Electronic Government Agency (AGE) announced that digital ID documents through the EVO app will be useable for interactions with banks and government agencies by June. The agency plans to eliminate the requirement to personally visit agencies by Fall through the use of electronic signatures. EVO is part of the government’s plan to digitize 100% of state services by 2030.

• President Sandu commemorated the victims of the Stalinist Famines. She marked the occasion, commemorated on the 3rd Sunday in April, in the village of Mingir where 1400 people died in the famine - nearly half of the population. She stated:

“The famine of 1946–1947 affected hundreds of thousands of people and led to the loss of 200,000 lives. Figures that still terrify us today, but which cannot fully encompass the trauma that parents and children, young and old, went through,” (…)

“When the truth is told, even after decades, it brings justice. It helps us to understand, not to forget and not to repeat. And, above all, only the truth sets us free,”

• Local Public Administration (LPA) reform is becoming contentious. The MAN party protested last week against the planned reform calling it “a direct attack on local public administration” and claiming that PAS would use it to eliminate mayors from other parties. Meanwhile, activists like Vasile Tofan continue to give interviews calling for more radical reform and urging the government to think bigger. The government hopes to pass LPA reform this year but we are still at the early stages of what promises to be a long process.

Energy Crisis

The energy crisis caused by the American-Israeli war against Iran continues to create uncertainty in Europe’s energy markets. The fragile ceasefire and negotiations have caused fuel prices to drop slightly in Moldova, but diesel remains 51% more expensive than before the war started while gasoline is 23% more expensive. Fuel imports continue without issue and the country continues to maintain stockpiles of around 19 days of gasoline and 11 days of diesel. With the situation slightly stabilizing, on April 15th, Prime Minister Munteanu again announced that he would ask parliament to lift the State of Emergency. At the time of writing he has not yet done this, possibly owing to the holiday schedule.

Rising prices continue to have knock-on effects with Transnistria announcing a 17% increase in ticket prices for suburban buses and intercity transit. Moldova’s Lukoil stations also continue to operate as the Trump Administration extended waivers on American sanctions until October.

In order to help farmers with the near term diesel prices, and the projected medium term problems with fertilizer, the Ministry of Agriculture announced that they were creating a new component of the Agricultural Credit Facility Program to support loans for working capital. The program is set to launch through banks within 2 weeks and provide lines of credit up to 500,000 lei at a fixed 5.1% APR for 5 years. This support is targeted at “micro and small farmers1.”

Transnistria & Security

Here’s a roundup of the top security stories of the week:

• Chisinau has declared the leadership of the Russian army in Transnistria “undesirable.” Zona de Securitate has reported that the military commanders and their deputies will be blocked from entering Moldova. Transnistrian “Foreign Minister” Ignatiev called the move “unreasonable and destructive,” noting that the Russian army units and the Russian “Peacekeepers” are “a single entity” and saying that any restriction on their operations would “negatively impact the peacekeeping operation.”

• Head of the Ukrainian Presidential Administration, General Kirill Budanov, says that the withdrawal of Russian troops from Transnistria is not part of peace negotiations with Russia. In an interview with Malenkaia Strana he called the troops there a “known threat” but stated that Ukraine is not putting this condition forward in order not to complicate the peace process.

• Romania is becoming a “boulevard for Russian drones.” That statement was made by former Romanian President Traian Băsescu who added “we are starting to look ridiculous.” The comments come after reports of multiple drone incursions into Romanian airspace in the delta region. DW reports that for multiple political and technical reasons Romania has made a decision not to shoot down these drones and to largely let them pass through the country’s airspace to attack Ukraine.

• The Russian Duma passed a bill in the first reading to allow the president to deploy military forces to “protect the rights of Russian citizens.” This bill focuses specifically on Russian citizens who are detained, arrested or prosecuted outside of Russia, and is likely being passed in the context of the EU’s proposals for setting up a “Special Tribunal for the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine.”

• Alexandru Balan will be extradited to Moldova following sentencing. The former director of Moldova’s Security and Intelligence Service (SIS) pled guilty to divulging state secrets and was sentenced last week to 1.5 years in prison. He joined the court hearings via video call as he is currently under house arrest in Romania where he faces treason charges (he is also a Romanian citizen) and up to 20 years in prison. Those charges relate to his participation in a Belarusian spy ring where he was caught passing secrets to the KGB. Romania has agreed to extradite him to Moldova to begin serving his sentence.

International Affairs

Here’s a roundup of the top international affairs stories of the week:

• President Sandu attended the Antalya Diplomatic Forum in Turkey. There she met on the sidelines with President Erdogan and discussed economic cooperation, attracting investments and “the protection of the Gagauz language and culture and joint support for the development of the region.” Turkey is Moldova’s 2nd largest export designation and the 4th largest source of foreign investment after Romania, Germany and France.

• A Moldovan Parliamentary Delegation held meetings in Washington DC. PAS MPs Radu Marian, Adrian Băluțel and Andrian Cheptonar, join Ambassador Vlad Kulminski for meetings with congressmen and Senators including Sen. Ted Budd (R-NC), Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT), Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), Rep. Keith Self (R-TX), Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY), Rep. Pat Harrigan (R-NC), Rep. Deborah Rep. Ross (D-NC), Rep. Bill Keating (D-MA) and others. MP Radu Marian wrote of the trip:

“We are here to consolidate the partnership between our countries and strengthen the parliamentary dialogue with the US Congress. I reiterated that US support in combating Russian pressure on the Republic of Moldova has been, is and will be essential for Moldova to remain a free, democratic country and part of the free world. We share the same values ​​with the US,” (…)

“I thanked for the recent investment of 130 million dollars for the Straseni-Gutinas power line, which is to be built by an American company2. I mentioned that the Republic of Moldova is ideally positioned for American investors who want to scale production and support the reconstruction efforts of post-war Ukraine”

Khotyn Fortress Partially Collapses

Today we’re ending on a bit of a sad note with the news that the iconic Khotyn Fortress in Ukraine had a partial collapse of its outer wall. Khotyn is one of the castles and fortresses built by Stefan Cel Mare when he was Voivode of Moldavia. It’s an iconic castle that many readers will have seen before in movies and, in my case, on the cover of my 4th grade history textbook in Virginia.

Unbelievably, the collapse was caught on camera and can be viewed online here. So unbelievable was the story that the mayor of the town was forced to put out a statement saying:

“Unfortunately, it is not artificial intelligence. Yesterday (April 17, 2026), a very unpleasant and extreme emergency situation occurred in our beautiful Hotin fortress. Yes, there was a partial collapse on the great wall. And this collapse is very significant. Everyone is alive! Most importantly, no one was injured,”

The local authorities plan on restoring the wall in the future.

Lots of news happened while I was on a short vacation so today’s update is a bit long - but I really encourage you to grab a coffee and dig in because there was lots of important news.

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The State of Emergency in the Energy Sector to Continue

After initially indicating that he would ask parliament to lift the State of Emergency, Prime Minister Munteanu convened the National Crisis Management Center on April 2 and announced that the State of Emergency will continue. Following the repair of the Isaccea-Vulcănești high voltage line, the energy system remains unstable as engineers check the repair and make adjustments. At the same time, April-May is a critical time in Moldova’s energy sector as the Thermoelectric plants will soon cease central heating and return to summer mode - causing a loss of around 50% of domestic energy production.

Moreover, the authorities particularly highlighted the crisis caused by the War in Iran. With the country 100% reliant on fuel imports, the decision to maintain the State of Emergency will also let the government adapt quickly to this new and larger crisis. The temporary cease fire between the United States and Iran caused diesel prices to fall slightly, but uncertainty remains after talks in Pakistan failed to find a solution over this weekend.

Moldova’s Ministry of Defense announced that all Moldovan soldiers deployed as part of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) are safe. Moldova has 32 peacekeepers deployed in south Lebanon with UNIFIL where they are serving alongside the Italian Army.

With these crises as a backdrop, Moldova announced a major milestone in the shift to renewables this week. The country has now exceeded 1 GW of installed renewable capacity, of which 73% is solar and 25% wind. The Ministry of Energy made the announcement stating:

“In the last five years, installed capacities have increased 13.23 times. Compared to 2020, when the total installed was only 77.37 MW, there is an increase of 946.05 MW, with 2025 playing a decisive role in this evolution,”

The Government Presents their Concept for LPA Reform

Alexei Buzu, Secretary General of the Government, unveiled the high level concept for the promised Local Public Administration (LPA) reform. He announced 4 objectives for the reforms, namely:

1. Strong mayors through administrative-territorial consolidation

2. Strong mayors through increased financial autonomy

3. Strong mayors through real institutional capacity

4. Strong mayors through transparency, accessible services and involved citizens

Essentially, they hope that efforts to create larger local government units will strengthen capacity and services at the local level. In order to accomplish these goals, the government laid out 3 high level changes:

• Voluntary amalgamation. The government has set a goal that no local authority (towns and villages) should have fewer than 3000 residents by 2027. Currently, 87% of town halls have fewer than 3000 residents. Buzu noted that 310 local councils are already starting the voluntary amalgamation process. At the same time, parliament is voting on legislation to simplify this process further. The reform plan provides for financial incentives for LPAs that chose to merge. Forced mergers for those that don’t is not spelled out but is heavily implied.

• Reducing the number of districts from 32 to 10. Moldova’s 32 raions (districts) would be replaced with 10 larger districts which Buzu said would be engines of regional development - managing roads and common infrastructure.

• Elevating Taraclia to a municipality with sub-LPAs. Essentially, the town government of Taraclia would be merged with the current Raion (district) government of Taraclia. Other towns and villages in the region would retain their local government. This would make the region something of a hybrid district-municipality. This special case is likely related to local demographics (see footnote1).

Secretary General Buzu explained the 3000 resident threshold saying:

“In the Republic of Moldova, out of 10 families that do not have sewage, 8 are in municipalities with a population of less than 3,000 inhabitants. Out of 10 families that do not have a water supply connection, 7 are in municipalities with a population of less than 3,000 inhabitants. This is the reality ,”

He went on to note how important it is for LPAs to have more capacity and expertise in order to attract funding through EU accession mechanisms and to implement local projects.

Business leader Vasile Tofan2 has emerged as a major critic to the proposal which he called “much too timid” and “too small for the size of the problem.” He stated:

“Local taxes in a town hall of 3-4 thousand people barely cover about 60% of the cost of the fiscal apparatus that collects them. In other words, almost 2 out of 3 lei in taxes are expenses on tax collectors - an absurd model ,”

Tofan went on to note that Romania averages 6000 residents per LPA and that these are going bankrupt. The country is exploring a move to a minimum of 18,000 residents. He explained:

“In other words, we are deliberately undertaking a very politically costly reform, unpopular anyway, in order to amalgamate at a level that was bankrupt from the start. What is the point of these costs then?”

Recent polling from IMAS has shown that 42% of citizens disapprove of the merging of city halls compared to 22% who consider is somewhat necessary, 18% who consider it important and only 7% who consider it extremely important. 65% oppose the merging of districts while 24% were in favor. The Socialist Party has called on the government to hold a referendum on the final plan.

Recall, Moldova Matters published an op-ed from Vasile Tofan on the subject in March:

News and Politics

Here’s a roundup of the top politics stories of the week:

• On April 2 parliament formally denounced Moldova’s membership in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). The degree was immediately promulgated by President Sandu. Parliament cited Russia’s failure to uphold the CIS agreement by invading Georgia and Ukraine while maintaining illegal troop deployments in Moldova. This is the biggest step so far in Moldova’s attempts to remove itself from the 1991 agreement and its many sub agreements.

• Mayor Ceban announced that his MAN party was withdrawing from the Alternative Bloc. At the same time the party will remain in the Alternative Faction in parliament. Explaining the reason he stated “We dissociate ourselves from any actions and statements that contradict the interests of the people and the course of European integration.3”

• Moldova fell in the EIU Democracy Index, published by the Economist, from a “flawed democracy” to “hybrid regime.” The index measures various factors across 167 countries and did not publicly explain the change for Moldova or detail the methodology. The news caused lots of opinions and assessments in Moldova, with opposition parties celebrating and repeating lines about PAS capturing the state. Analysts suggested that the change was likely the methodology’s failure to account for hybrid attacks and the government’s response. IPRE Director Iulian Groza explained:

“In other words, a country that actively defends itself against hybrid aggression paradoxically pays a methodological price in the index for its own defensive measures,”

• Scandal at MediaCor - Yuri Dud’s interview with Denis Kapustin. Russian YouTuber Yuri Dud interviewed the leader of the Russian Volunteer Corps at the media center located on the State University campus. Kapustin is banned from the Schengen area and has been widely described as a neo-Nazi. His volunteer corps fights for Ukraine with a manifesto focused on overthrowing Putin and creating a Russian ethnostate. The Ministry of Education promised an investigation into how the interview took place at MediaCor, while the center’s management put out a statement saying that they do “not intervene in the selection of guests or in the editorial content of the materials produced” in the center.

• No Easter benefits this year. Minister of Labor and Social Protection Natalia Plugaru answered a reporters question on the topic saying that the focus was instead on winter heating compensation. Last year (an election year) more than 230,000 people benefited from one time holiday payments of between 1500 and 5000 lei. Meanwhile, Alexandr Stoianoglo proposed a bill in parliament to give an Easter Amnesty and drop all charges and fines related to electoral bribery and vote selling. While he couched the bill in religious terms, it was hard to avoid the fact that these voters were largely bribed by the Shor network to vote for him.

• PPDA connections with Shor? Vasile Costiuc’s Democracy at Home (PPDA) party announced that their candidate for Orhei Mayor this year will be Victor Perțu. This means that Unionist party PPDA is running a former senior member of the Shor party and campaigner for the Pobeda Bloc in one of the most significant mayor’s races in the country. Costiuc initially dodged questions about the nomination before giving this answer filled with confusing and unsubstantiated allegations:

“if the man is not officially banned from holding office, if he is not convicted, if he has not stolen and is not under criminal investigation, I do not see the logic in talking about a man who, what did he do? Carp and Maia Sandu participated in the theft of the billion”

• Minister of Finance Andrian Gavriliță announced that the President and Prime Minister are getting a raise. Currently President Sandu is the lowest paid head of state in Europe with a salary of just 22,000 lei / month. The Prime Minister currently earns 17,000 lei. In the last PAS term, salaries for ministers and other high level officials were raised but these top positions were skipped due to political sensitivities. The Socialists and other opposition parties regularly call for ministers to earn no more than a minimum pension. Responding to this expected criticism, the Minister of Finance stated that a “worthy country cannot pretend that politicians do not need salaries. I propose to citizens to beware of politicians who tell them that they will work even without salaries.”

International Affairs

Here’s a roundup of the top foreign policy stories of the week:

• Europe has woken up to a future without Viktor Orban. Responding to the landslide victory of pro-EU reformer Peter Magyar, President Sandu posted congratulations writing:

“Moldova looks forward to accelerating our partnership with Hungary — building on the friendship that unites our people — and to working together for a stronger, more united, resilient Europe.”

• US Senator Jack Reed (D-RI) visited Chisinau on a working trip. The ranking member of the US Senate Armed Services Committee met with President Sandu and discussed the regional security situation, EU integration and joint US-Moldovan projects.

• A group of opposition MPs traveled to Georgia to meet with parliamentary factions and the Georgian Dream government. The group included Igor Dodon, 2 other socialist MPs, an MP from Alternative and Vasile Costiuc of PPDA. PAS and Our Party declined to join the delegation. Following meetings, Igor Dodon suggested that Georgia’s political situation4 “is a good example, which Moldova should follow.”

Transnistria and Security News

Here’s a roundup of the top security stories of the week:

• Mihail Podoleak, advisor to President Zelenskyy, confirmed that mines were placed on some parts of the border with Transnistria. He explained that this was a precaution against Russia being tempted to use the region to conduct strikes against Ukrainian infrastructure and logistics.

• On April 3 another Russian drone entered Moldovan airspace before returning to Ukraine.

• The “authorities” in Tiraspol premiered a new “documentary” titled “The Transnistrian People: Forged Over the Centuries.” The propaganda film, largely made with AI, sought to position the “Transnistrian people” at the center of various major historical events in Europe.

• Former Transnistrian official Ruslan Mova was denied entry into Moldova. Mova is the former head of the region’s Ministry of Internal Affairs and was one of 9 regional officials stripped of their Moldovan citizenship by President Sandu in February. The motivation for Mova was his direction of, and participation in, the imprisonment of political prisoners and repression against the population. He left Chisinau on a Ukrainian passport and was stopped on March 30 trying to renter the country. With Moldova controlling 100% of the active “border crossings” into Transnistria, this means that officials who lose their citizenship due to human rights abuses risk either being trapped in the region, or trapped outside of it.

• Ion Chirița and Nikita Sirenko were convicted and sentenced in relation to their participation in training camps in Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. The men were part of Shor’s efforts to prepare for mass riots and violent demonstrations around the 2024 presidential elections. In particular, they were trained in piloting and using military style drones and making explosives and incendiary devices. The men admitted their action but claimed they were patsies for others. Ion Chirița was sentenced to 3 years in prison, suspended, and Nikita Sirenko was sentenced to 3.5 years with 3 years suspended. Sirenko, a Finnish citizen, will be expelled from Moldova at the end of his sentence.

• The US Department of Justice alongside European partners including Ukraine and Romania dismantled a worldwide network of infected home routers. The hack, directed by Russia’s GRU, used DNS poisoning to monitor traffic and create phony websites in order to capture login details and monitor messaging and emails. If you want to read more about this tactic, and how it was used to attack Moldova’s elections, see my recent report:

Economics and Infrastructure

Here’s a roundup of the top economic stories of the week:

• Moody’s has upgraded Moldova’s credit rating from B3 to B2. This is the highest credit rating for the country in 25 years. The company cited ongoing reforms, progress on EU accession and a “demonstrated an increased capacity to respond to shocks” - noting particularly the pivot away from Russian energy, efforts which they say have “contributed to an overall reduction in Moldova’s political event risk from previously very high levels.” New reports show that Moldova’s external debt was €10.11 billion euros as of December 31, 2025. This is up 2.4% since 2024 but down 2.7% as a percent of GDP. The vast majority of these loans are long term and at favorable interest rates from the IMF (27%), World Bank (26%), European Commission (15%), EBRD (7.8%) and others.

• The Ministry of Finance will delay VAT taxes on small imports until Fall. The imposition of VAT on parcels under €150 euros was planned to come into effect in July but has now been moved with a planned testing period in September and full implementation in October.

• Parliament is working to replace the Prima Casa (First House) program. High demand has led to the year’s funds for the program already being depleted on April 1st. Prima Casa is a subsidized preferential mortgage program with lower rates and a minimum down payment. The program will continue through banks, but government funds for additional subsidies for first home buyers are depleted. Critics of the program and its expansion under the last parliament say that it created demand for housing exceeding the supply resulting in a run up in pricing. That happened, and now the real estate market has essentially stalled with Q1 sales down 80% year on year. Chair of the Parliamentary Committee on the Economy, Budget and Finance, Radu Marian stated that the program “must be replaced with a mechanism that will stimulate the construction of new affordable apartments, rather than create pressure on the market through increased demand.” This new mechanism to encourage the construction of affordable housing will be announced soon.

• Parliament has introduced a draft law to eliminate tariffs on American goods. The law would have exceptions for local products including beef, pork, poultry and dairy. Speaker Grosu presented it as a “reciprocal gesture5” for the US dropping tariffs on Moldova from 25% to 10%, and spoke about the substantial support provided to Moldova from the United States including in energy infrastructure.

Crime, Corruption and Justice Reform

On March 31st anti-corruption police (CNA) and Anti-Corruption Prosecutors announced the detention of 4 police employees and 1 prosecutor for:

“complicity in passive corruption, manifested by the illicit demand of 400 thousand dollars for the settlement of a criminal case .”

Allegedly the accused demanded this bribe to sway the outcome of an undisclosed money laundering case. Newsmaker reported that other officers of the police unit, the National Investigation Inspectorate (INI), felt that their fellow officers were being detained on flimsy evidence. Many officers attempted to join the preliminary court hearings but were not let in. There were rumors that members of the INI resigned en-masse, but the Ministry of Internal Affairs responded saying that “There were dissatisfactions. We worked with the management team, both of the INI and the IGP. Today, this team is intact.”

Details on the alleged bribery are scant so we’ll return to this story as it develops.

On March 28 Moldova’s Minister of Energy announced that the high voltage line struck during Russia’s attack on the March 23 was fully repaired. This followed a difficult few days with the country coming very close to instituting rolling blackouts on March 27 due to challenges purchasing enough import capacity.

Minister of Energy Dorin Junghietu, speaking to ZdG stated, that this “was a deliberate attack” and provided more information on the target saying:

“We have seen several photos, but they cannot be made public, because they are sensitive information and would expose more than they should, but one of the critical pillars of this line was deliberately attacked with several drones. They knew very well where to hit, where they wanted to hit.”

He put the attack in the context of the recent “accident or attack at the hydroelectric power plant in Ukraine, which polluted our Dniester River” strongly implying that Russia was targeting infrastructure in Ukraine what would necessarily have a knock-on effect in Moldova. He described the high voltage line pillar targeted as “critical” and also hard to repair. This is partly because it is in a remote location in the Danube delta region that is inaccessible for heavy equipment if the ground is wet from rain.

While the acute phase of the emergency has passed, this vulnerability remains. The Minister has pledged to complete the works on the Vulcănești – Chișinău power line by May, but noted that it will not protect from this specific targeting as a small part of the line will still pass through Ukraine1.

Kremlin disinformation campaigns targeted the country’s vulnerability, with Russian state media reporting on the problem - but not the cause - and social media campaigns blaming it on “incompetence of the government.” Socialist MP Bogdan Țîrdea and fugitive former Shor Party MP Marina Tauber called the State of Emergency a fiction designed to create fear and take away personal liberties.

A main narrative is also that Moldova should restart purchases of electricity from the MGRES power plant in Transnistria - currently impractical if not impossible2. Socialist MPs Igor Dodon and Zinaida Greceanîi traveled to Moscow on a “short-term working visit” to discuss energy supply and blame the PAS government for not purchasing energy from Russia / MGRES.

The government announced that it plans to ask parliament to lift the State of Emergency next week after the repaired line is fully tested and certified. The Ministry of Foriegn Affairs also announced that they plan to seek compensation from Russia for the damage3.

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Iran Energy Crisis

While the high voltage line strike was an acute crisis, the much bigger crisis facing Moldova is the energy crisis caused by the United States’ and Israel’s war against Iran. Prices continue to rise with diesel now 56.3% more expensive than when the war began and gasoline 25.7% more expensive. As of March 30th fuel stocks provide for 17 days of supply for gasoline, 7 days for diesel and 16 days for LPG. While imports are continuing as normal there are substantial worries across Europe of shortages if the war continues much longer.

On March 26 the government met in extraordinary session and has begun implementing response measures including:

• The National Energy Regulatory Agency (ANRE) will update its formula for calculating standard diesel price limits. Previously the formula relied on a 14 day average of purchase prices, now it will use a 7 day average. This will allow prices to rise more quickly and prevent gas stations from closing en-masse when the purchase price exceeds the allowed retail price.

• If gas stations run out of standard diesel, they are required to sell premium diesel at the standard price.

• Lukoil is allowed to purchase supplies on the local market to supply their stations. This rule does not allow them to restart imports or violate other aspects of American sanctions, but is designed to expand the number of operating gas stations during the crisis.

• Regulated fare prices for bus and mini-bus routes will be updated weekly according to price rises.

• Fuel importers are required to present their April plans to the government and are prohibited from importing less fuel in April than they did in March.

Reactions and Analysis

Moldova’s Union of Transporters and Road Workers (UTA) called the initial 16% increase in bus and mini-bus fares “a superficial measure that does not solve the root of the problem.” They blamed the government for imposing a regulated market but not taking responsibility via subsidies for a crisis. The association is calling for 0% VAT rate on fuel for transport operators, deferred tax payments for new vehicle imports, direct subsidies via travel vouchers for vulnerable passengers (pensioners, students, etc) and more. They also noted that the “disastrous state of district and inter-district roads” following Moldova’s harshest winter in a decade is another hidden tax on them as they struggle to maintain and repair their vehicles.

UTA and farmers are among the first groups to face stress from this crisis but certainly not the last. Experts interviewed by ZdG painted a bleak economic picture and few solutions for the government. Eugen Muravschi from Watchdog explained that the biggest issue is diesel which is used for agriculture and transit. He noted that Moldova’s excise taxes on fuel are already low - more than 2x lower than the European norm - which leaves very little room to cut. These taxes also fund road repair and after last winter the road network is a mess. A VAT cut for all fuel sales would be too damaging for the budget, but he suggested that targeted measures for farmers and transport operators might help.

Adrian Lupusor director of the think-tank Expert-Grup presented an analysis showing a real economic crisis may be coming. He wrote:

“If the oil crisis persists or intensifies, prices at $120–$140 per barrel could reduce Moldova’s GDP by 10 percentage points due to rising import prices, production costs, and consumer prices. This could lead to an economic recession of approximately -5% in 2026 and a continued shock into 2027,”

He noted that Moldova is more vulnerable than its neighbors because fuel imports account for a high percentage of all imports at 15.9%. His analysis indicates that the inflation caused by fuel prices should mostly be absorbed by the coming economic recession4.

Analysis: The Bigger Picture

Naturally, Kremlin disinformation networks are spreading narratives blaming the government, or sometimes Romania, for the shortages. They are likely trying to plant useful stories now in the hopes that some take root when the crisis spreads from the pump to the wider economy in the coming weeks and months.

The success of that campaign seems doubtful. More than any economic crisis in living memory this crisis can clearly be attributed to one man - Donald Trump. Americans worried about $4 / gallon gas may not realize that Europe is now facing $7 - $8 / gallon rates5 - numbers that are expected to rise sharply if this war continues.

That’s the best case scenario. Politico reports multiple European leaders describing sleepless nights as they try and deal with an oil supply shock larger than that of 1973, 1979 and the war in Ukraine combined. Leaders are now contemplating options for “demand destruction” including drive-free Sundays, gas rationing and similar approaches.

While polls show that Americans overwhelmingly disapprove of this war, I don’t get the impression that they widely understand how enraged Europeans are. In a recent podcast from Pod Save America, Jon Lovett described Trump’s negotiations with Iran as 2 people playing chicken after the cars have already crashed head on - just shouting at each other over blown airbags. In that analogy, Europe (and even more so East Asia) are like collateral roadkill that neither party noticed except when Trump somehow blames them for the crash. The war has seriously threatened NATO’s cohesion, been a massive boon to the Russian war effort and threatens huge and lasting harm to the continent’s economies.

With no end in sight, this war is upending the global security and economic order - and small countries like Moldova have very few ways to insulate themselves from the damage.

If you’re interested in a more comprehensive analysis of the European vs American perspectives on this war, I recommend the most recent episode of The Rest is Politics Podcast.

International Affairs & Security

Here’s a roundup of the top international affairs and security news of the week:

• President Sandu made the first official visit of a Moldovan head of state to Slovakia. There she signed agreements on promoting joint investments and on deepening security cooperation. The President thanked Slovakia for assisting both in the Nistru river cleanup and in supporting the provision of electricity during the recent crisis. She highlighted both crises as examples of how “Ukraine’s resilience matters far beyond Ukraine itself. It is essential for Moldova’s security and for European security as a whole.”

• Speaker of Parliament Igor Grosu attended the 4th anniversary of the Bucha massacre in Ukraine. In the 22 days that the Kyiv suburb was occupied, ending on March 31, 2022, Russia committed more than 9000 war crimes and murdered more than 1700 civilians. Writing about the event Speaker Grosu stated:

“It’s been four years since the massacre in the city of Bucea, one of the towns in the suburbs of Kiev, which experienced unimaginable atrocities from the Russian army. I was there four years ago. I saw it. And you can’t forget it. Today, together with other European leaders, we commemorated the victims of that massacre,”

• Transnistria further delays salary payments. In June 2025 the regional “authorities” began splitting salary payments into 2 installments6 allowing for the second half of the payment to come at the end of the following month. This has now been pushed back further until the 9th of the next month. This delaying tactic is essentially a zero interest loan from workers to their employer and, while it can buy time, it does not materially change the conditions causing the crisis.

• On March 31 another drone entered Moldovan airspace. The Shahed drone was tracked on Ukrainian radar as it flew over Transnistria for around 7 minutes before returning to Ukraine.

• Ukraine has announced new security measures on their border with Transnistria. The Ukrainian army has announced that the border is now “heavily mined” and that they are in the process of installing barbed wire and autonomous video warning systems. They have also announced the deployment of additional mechanized troops to strengthen the defenses.

Politics

Here’s a roundup of the top politics stories of the week:

• Parliament has accepted the resignation of PAS MP Nicolae Botgros. The famous composer previously announced his resignation because he felt forced to choose between politics and music due to laws around side-jobs. Opposition MP Renato Usatii proposed an amendment of these laws to allow musicians, actors and athletes to continue with their careers while in parliament. Currently, only academic jobs are allowed for sitting MPs. Speaker Igor Grosu supported the idea and suggested that parliament study loosening the rules, noting that Moldova has far stricter compatibility rules than other countries in the region including Romania.

• The EU delegation announced that the Chisinau-Ungheni rail line would be the first electrified railway in the country. It will be rebuilt on European rail guage and allow for travel of up to 140 km / h. The Ministry of Infrastructure has previously announced that the first phase of this project will connect downtown Chisinau to the Eugen Doga International Airport.

• Irina Vlah had a wonderful birthday. The opposition politician declared 423,000 lei in cash birthday gifts for her recent 51st birthday. These came from dozens of people - family, former employees, party members and even a former interim president of the Supreme Court of Justice (SCJ). This birthday haul exceeded 2 times her annual salary. Moldovan birthday traditions are really very strict - you buy all of your friends and family dinner and drinks and they give you gifts - which are very rarely cash. When you become a (certain type of) politician, suddenly, lots of cash gifts. What a wonderful tradition.

Crime & Corruption

Here are the top justice sector stories of the week:

• Justice reform is progressing, but judges are under heavy pressure. That was the takeaway this week from the General Assembly of Judges convened by the Superior Council of Magistracy. Guest speakers included President Sandu and European Commissioner for Democracy, Justice, the Rule of Law and Consumer Protection, Michael McGrath who spoke on justice reform. A report on 2025 activity showed that judges are now averaging 103.7 cases per month, a 24.3% increase from 2024. The removal of judges who fail vetting has continued to increase pressure on those who remain.

• Veaceslav Platon’s trial hasn’t had a hearing in a year. The last hearing in the case of “fraud and money laundering in particularly large proportions” was heard in March 2025 as judges have repeatedly accepted requests for delays due to Platon’s lawyer being on sick leave. Platon is scheduled to have his UK extradition hearing from May 11 - 13, after his lawyers there successfully delayed it from its originally scheduled November 2025 dates. Platon has been out on bail in the UK since July 2025.

Ending on a High Note

Moldovan musician Sergei Stepanov, known as “Epic Sax Guy,” appeared on Britain’s Got Talent, getting “yes” votes from all 4 judges. Simon Cowell liked the performance, but seemed genuinely baffled as to who this strange dancing saxophone player was. Not so with Rapper judge Olajide Olayinka Williams (KSI), who is apparently a mega-fan and basically went crazy while the performance was happening.

Epic Sax Guy became a household name across Europe after competing in Eurovision in 2017 for Moldova with the band SunStroke Project. Their performance of “Hey Mamma” got 3rd place, which was frankly a crime as they were far better than the top 2.

If you want to put a smile on your face, here’s the Britain’s Got Talent appearance:

…and here’s Hey Mamma from 2017

…and here’s Moldova’s delightfully insane and genuinely fun 2026 Eurovision entry

Ok, that’s much better than economic crisis and war. I hope it cheered you up as much as it did me.

“Please pay special attention to air raid signals today. There are intelligence reports that Russian forces may be preparing a massive attack. Appropriate instructions for our air defense forces have already been issued. Please take care of yourselves and Ukraine ,”

There was a massive attack with Russian drones overnight as well as a major daytime attack on March 24th. In total Russia launched more than 1000 drones against Ukraine including Shaheds and Gerbers1. Ukrainian air defense shot down 541 drones but 15 got through and scored hits.

At 7:15 pm on March 23rd residents in Chisinau noticed the lights briefly go out and then flicker back on. In the morning the Ministry of Energy announced that the key high-voltage line between Isaccea (Romania) - Vulcănești (Moldova) had been hit and damaged. They wrote:

“On the evening of March 23, at around 7:15 p.m., due to Russian attacks on the territory of Ukraine, our energy infrastructure, the property of the Republic of Moldova, was affected. What happened? Several “Shahed” drones targeted our energy infrastructure. And as we see in this picture, this is the effect.“

Understanding the Infrastructure Situation

On January 31st, 2025 most of Moldova lost power due to “serious problems in the Ukrainian power grid” that caused a massive voltage drop on the Isaccea-Vulcăneşti-MGRES high voltage line - which triggered automatic disconnections. At the time I wrote a detailed overview of the key infrastructure and I recommend re-reading that article for context. In short, Moldova gets up to 60% of its power from Romania via a line that runs from Isaccea in Romania through Ukraine to Vulcăneşti in Moldova and then back and forth across the Moldovan-Ukrainian border before it meets the MGRES power plant in Transnistria. From there the power line runs to Chisinau.

The damage on March 23rd was to a particularly critical section of that power line between Isaccea and Vulcăneşti which also runs through Ukraine. You can see the whole system on the map on the left as well as an illustration of the part targeted on the map on the right below.

Moldova has been working to create its own direct connection to Romanian power via the Vulcăneşti - Chisinau high voltage line that was supposed to be completed in December but is running behind schedule. That line would allow Moldova to bypass Transnistria BUT critically not fully avoid transiting Ukrainian territory. It would still require the small segment Isaccea-Vulcăneşti which was targeted.

At the time of writing we do not know if this was intentionally targeted by Russia or if it was accidentally hit by a drone targeting the Ukrainian port of Remi (either off-course or shot down). We do know that this was the first Russian attack directly on Moldovan owned critical infrastructure in this war.

State of Emergency

On March 24th Prime Minister Munteanu convened the National Crisis Management Center and requested that parliament be called into extraordinary session to declare a state of emergency. He stated:

“Crash drones were identified in the immediate vicinity of the affected infrastructure, which imposes access restrictions for technical teams and the need to carry out demining works to fully allow the necessary intervention and in safe conditions,”

Parliament was convened on March 24th and held a debate on declaring a State of Emergency in the Energy sector for the next 60 days. Prime Minister Munteanu explained the gravity of the situation saying:

“The 4 interconnection lines with Romania have been activated, but the situation remains complicated. Starting tomorrow, the estimated deficit will reach 350-400 MW during peak hours. Chain disconnections, as you can deduce, remain very possible. We cannot rule out new attacks, we cannot wait,”

The these interconnections mean that the country is maintaining electricity through emergency “island connections” via smaller 110 kV lines. I explained island connections in the January article I referenced above.

The Minister of Energy estimated that repairs could take 5-7 days. The reason is that explosive materials remain on the site and army sappers have to make it safe before technicians can affect the repairs. There is also the risk of continued attacks on the line.

The State of Emergency was passed with 72 votes in favor, 18 abstentions and 0 against. Igor Dodon explained that the Socialists refused to vote for the bill because their suggestion that Moldova start buying power from the MGRES plant again were not taken into account (I’ll explain why this makes no sense in a footnote2).

Following the declaration of the State of Emergency, the government issued a series of orders and recommendations as follows:

• Called on all users to minimize electrical consumption during peak hours (6 am - 9 am and 5 pm - 11 pm). They warn against the use of elevators in this time in case of outages.

• Mandated that Thermoelectric plants in Balti and Chisinau have been instructed to produce at full capacity.

• Called on public and commercial buildings to reduce light by 30% and refrain from using decorative and advertising lights.

• Called on industrial activities to schedule operations outside of peak hours.

• Mandated export and re-export restrictions on petroleum products until a stockpile of 5,000 tons of gasoline and 25,000 tons of diesel are stored.

• Accelerated import processes for fuels.

• Restricted gas station purchases in containers to 20L jerrycans.

• Instructed grid operators to prioritize hospitals and critical infrastructure in case of shortages and resort to rolling blackouts as a last resort.

Chisinau Mayor Ion Ceban called on city residents to conserve power and he condemned the “the war and Russia’s attacks on Ukraine.” He announced plans to move schools to online education and suspend trolleybus routes if there are major shortages.

On March 25th the National Agency for Energy Regulation (ANRE) met to approve a decrease in electricity prices, but postponed the move for the duration of the State of Emergency.

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The Other Energy Crisis

This new State of Emergency replaces last week’s State of Alert which was called to respond to America and Israel’s war against Iran. Fuel prices continue to increase in response to the global supply shock with prices for gasoline now 23.74% higher than before the war and for diesel 49.3% higher.

This has caused the Employers’ Association of Auto Transport Operators (APOTA) to announce that “an enormous number of regular district and inter-district trips [bus and mini-bus routes] will be suspended, and their number could reach 80% of the total number.” The prices of bus tickets are regulated and the association claims that the National Road Transport Agency (ANTA) is not raising prices fast enough to keep routes profitable.

On March 23rd President Sandu convened the National Security Council (NSC) and after meeting warned that prices will continue to rise. She stated:

“All of the energy shocks, despite the measures we have taken—and because we do not have oil, because we do not have natural gas—are clearly affecting us through rising prices, both at the household level and across economic sectors. We will continue to monitor the situation, and our hope is that this crisis will end sooner rather than later, but we must also prepare for the worst-case scenarios

We have a pricing formula, or a price formation mechanism, that assumes a slower transition to market prices—over a period of 14 days—and this helps us, to some extent, avoid extreme volatility. However, this does not mean that prices will not eventually reach global market levels,”

Right now prices in Moldova remain lower than those in Romania and much of the region because of this 14 day transition period. Across Europe many countries have different levels of market responsiveness to rapid price changes which has led to drivers crossing borders to fill up in other states and countries like Hungary to create differentiated prices for citizens vs foreigners.

President Sandu went on to speak about support mechanisms for farmers, but noted that the only long term options is increased adoption of renewables. Indeed, without Moldova’s hard pivot to wind and solar it is likely the country would already face substantial rolling blackouts.

President Sandu concluded saying:

“So, I repeat, we are monitoring the situation, and it is a worrying one. I will say this plainly: it is a very worrying situation if things do not stabilize, if prices do not stabilize in the coming weeks,”

Nistru Oil Spill Updates

On March 19th Prime Minister Munteanu announced that water supplies were being reconnected for Balti, Soroca, Singerei and Floresti. He stated:

“I know that these days have been difficult. Thank you for your patience. I also thank the teams in the field who worked non-stop so that people have water. The interventions at the Cosăuți station and in the localities have yielded results. The supply is being resumed in stages, with strict control at each stage. The installed filters remain in operation, and the teams remain in the field for continuous monitoring and rapid intervention, if necessary”

This outcome was achieved via a massive cleanup effort by many parts of the Moldovan state including the National Army. It was supported by Romania and donations from EU partners including Poland and Belgium. Many filters and dams were installed along the river which allowed for the water feeding these towns and regions to return to safe levels.

On March 25th Minister of Environment Gheorghe Hajder posted a video from Ukraine where he was checking on the origin of the spill. He explained that the origin of the leak (still unnamed) had been stopped and no more oil was entering the river. He explained that small slicks may still be seen working their way down the river but with the containment mechanisms in place and the source of the problem stopped the crisis was ending.

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Politics & General News

Here’s a roundup of the other top stories of the week:

• Parliament voted for the final denunciation of Moldova’s participation in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). The bill passed in the first reading 58-28. Moldova joined the CIS after it was created in Minsk in January 1993 along with many former Soviet Republics. Moldova has slowly been disentangling itself from various multilateral aspects of the CIS since 2022.

• Ion Ceban claims that the Nistru oil spill was not real. The mayor claimed that without official test results he did not believe what the government was saying and alleged that it was all a 2 pronged conspiracy. First, to distract from rising gasoline and diesel prices, second, to “introduce a foreign operator to provide water and sewerage services in the north of the country.”

• Invest Moldova has begun a major promotion campaign on the BBC. The campaign, titled “Moldova – a Trustful3 Partner for Export,” plans to air 250 TV broadcast commercials on BBC news from February through April. They are targeting 5 million views. You can see one of the videos on youtube here.

• PAS MP Nicolae Botgros has resigned from parliament. The famous conductor and artistic director of the National Folk Music Orchestra “Lăutarii” had run in 11th place on the PAS list. He has publicly struggled with a transition to politics and has been accused of incompatibly splitting his time by continuing some performances. This month RISE posted an investigation into a real estate deal that Lăutarii was involved in which began as a public project for a music school and ended as an apartment building. Nicolae Botgros denied wrongdoing, and it isn’t clear if the investigation prompted his resignation. Asked to comment on his resignation he simply said “where is art, where is politics, they are far apart.” At the beginning of this Spring 2026 parliamentary session he had previously promised to remain in parliament “until they take him with his feet to the other side.” He joins an unusually high number of MPs who ran on the PAS list only to leave parliament very early in their term.

Plahotniuc Will be Sentenced on April 22nd

This date was set by the court after hearing closing arguments from the prosecution and defense. The case involves his role in the theft of $1 billion dollars from 3 Moldovan banks. In their closing arguments the prosecution requested a 25 year jail sentence - the maximum allowed. The defense called for an acquittal and accused both the prosecutors and the judges4 of not acting neutrally in the trial. Plahotniuc himself took the stand on the final day to speak in favor of his innocence. The court will proclaim guilt or innocence and announce the sentence on April 22nd.

March 7th strikes on the Dniester Hydroelectric Station in Ukraine have resulted in an environmental crisis in Moldova. The strikes began the process of a spillage of technical oil into the Nistru river which has since flowed downstream and threatened the water supplies for much of Moldova’s Northeast.

By March 11th the city of Balti was forced to cut off drinking water as oil reached the pumping station and water tests showed high levels of contamination. By March 13th Moldovan, Ukrainian and Romanian teams were working to contain the oil using oil containment booms and other containment technologies. Minister of Environment, Gheorghe Hajder traveled to Soroca to monitor the situation and Prime Minister Munteanu dispatched the army to assist with cleanup and containment. He also requested the activation of the European Union Civil Protection Mechanism “for the rapid mobilization of teams of specialists and the equipment necessary to manage the situation on the ground.” The Prime Minister later traveled to Soroca himself to monitor the situation.

There he stated:

“Together with the Minister of the Environment, Gheorghe Hajder, we are in Soroca to monitor the situation on the ground. (…) Additional filters are being installed, and straw bales are being used in the water – an effective method for retaining petroleum substances. In parallel, the mobile laboratory is taking samples from the field every six hours to constantly monitor the water quality.”

Following this visit the government approved a 15 day “State of Alert” regarding the oil spill. This frees up some resources to prevent the situation from escalating, while falling short of being a full State of Emergency declaration.

Over the last few days large parts of the North of Moldova have been cut off from their water supplies. Supplies were suspended in Naslavcea, in the districts of Soroca, Florești, Sîngerei and in the Balti municipality. Chisinau’s water authorities have been installing protective dams around the Vadul lui Vodă pumping station.

Villages and towns are relying on their wells and in many cases are rushing to clean older wells and put them back into use. The most acute problems are in the city of Balti which has moved to remote schooling and called for help supplying emergency water. Balti Mayor Alexandru Petkov announced that the city of Iași in Romania was sending a humanitarian convoy of water trucks. Additionally the Moldovan Army has sent trucks and is distributing water to people in affected areas. As of March 17th more than 95 tons of drinking and technical water had been transported to Balti for distribution.

Minister Hajder has stated that the Ukrainian authorities have not explained what caused the oil leak. He stated:

“As soon as we learned of Russia’s attack on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, we requested official information; we even had a telephone conversation. I was told that several engines were damaged. We don’t know exactly what happened because these hydroelectric power plants are under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Energy and are protected by martial law,”

He said that they promised more information soon. It remains unclear how long the cleanup will last or whether it will force water disruptions in Chisinau, which relies on the Nistru river for 98% of its water supply.

Moldova’s Ministry of Foriegn Affairs summoned Russia’s Ambassador-Designate1 Oleg Ozerov to issue a formal condemnation of the attack against the hydroelectric plant. At the meeting, the Ambassador-Designate was “gifted” with a bottle of oily water from the Nistru.

As of March 17th Chisinau Mayor Ion Ceban has stated that no water outages are expected in Chisinau at this time. He claimed that his team is testing the water hourly and leveled criticism at the government for mishandling the situation in Balti. He demanded transparent testing results and suggested that technical water should continue to be supplied to the city.

Minister of the Environment, Gheorghe Hajder responded with a video where he called the mayor’s statements “extremely irresponsible.” He noted that city hall is able to test the water for pH, not for oil - and therefore the tests Ceban is touting are useless. He also noted that the supply of technical water is a bad idea saying:

“⁠The mayor orders us to provide technical water to Bălți. A dangerous and, again, irresponsible request. How does the mayor guarantee that no child or elderly person or any resident will accidentally drink the water that the mayor proposes to turn on in the taps. Moreover, if we now provide water to the supply network, knowing that it has petroleum substances in it, we will poison the network.”

The Minister went on to note that oily water pumped into the system could take months to clean out.

Iran War Crisis

Moldova continues to feel the aftershocks of the ongoing war in the Persian Gulf as fuel prices continue to rise. Compared to prices before the American-Israeli attack on Iran, prices for gasoline have increased 16.4% at the pump and for diesel 36.1%. The National Energy Regulatory Agency (ANRE) sets maximum prices daily based on a formula that tracks the Platts average (S&P Global) and then factors in merchant margins and taxes. These rates are climbing at an accelerating rate as market uncertainty grows.

Minister of Energy Dorin Junghietu has sought to calm consumers, explaining that imports of fuel are continuing as normal and that the country maintains stocks of 22 days of LPG, 12 days of gasoline and 11 of diesel2. The Minister has called on people to purchase only what they need and avoid hoarding fuel. He noted that while the legislation in force does not permit rationing, he is calling on people to be responsible and noting that gas stations filling illegal containers will be fined.

This Ministry has also been promoting their e-Carburanti (e-Fuels) website which shows the prices of fuel and availability at all gas stations in Moldova in real time. They are promoting the site in an attempt to prevent additional runs on gas stations.

The rising fuel costs are already forcing the government to make difficult decisions. Prime Minister Munteanu has called on all departments in the government to economize. He stated:

“In a tense international economic context and with increasing pressures on energy and fuel prices, the state must set the first example of financial discipline and responsibility towards public money.

Non-critical purchases will be reduced by at least 10%, and expenses for official transportation and the number of transport units will be reduced by at least 20%.

Public resources must be concentrated where they are truly needed: in infrastructure, in the functioning of essential state services and in maintaining economic stability,”

The Ministry of Agriculture has announced tax support policies for farmers seeking to buy diesel ahead of the planting season, and Chisinau Mayor Ceban announced that city hall lost millions of lei over the last 2 weeks due to rising prices.

Moldova Gets Nightly Drone Overflights

Since March 14th there have been numerous reports of Shahed or “Shahed like” drones crossing into Moldovan airspace. One crossed into Moldova on the night of the 14th and then subsequently left the airspace. Another on the 16-17th which crash landed in a field near Tudora and another on 17-18th which exited the airspace and was shot down over Ukraine.

Addressing the second drone, President Sandu stated:

“The Russian drone discovered today in the village of Tudora, Moldova, was assessed as carrying explosives. This is a gross violation of our airspace and a threat to our citizens. Russia systematically violates our sovereignty and puts the lives of our people at risk,”

This drone was a Shahed and was subsequently destroyed by Moldovan sappers in a controlled explosion.

Foriegn Affairs

Here’s a roundup of the top foreign affairs stories of the week:

• President Sandu visited Vilnius Lithuania on the occasion of the 36th anniversary of the restoration of Lithuanian independence. On her trip she met with the country’s President Gitanas Nausėda as well as other senior leaders. They discussed Moldova’s EU aspirations, common security threats and bilateral relations. Speaking of Lithuania’s support for Moldova President Sandu stated that "In Brussels, within the European Council and in every room where our accession is discussed, Lithuania is a reliable friend.” President Sandu also addressed the Lithuanian Parliament where she noted that the 1939 Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact sealed the fates of both countries saying "We simply found ourselves in an empire that we had never chosen." She spoke of Lithuania’s leadership as the first country to declare independence from Soviet Occupation and how Moldova was the first country to recognize that - even as Moldova remained officially part of the Soviet Union itself.

• The Bucharest Court of Appeal rejected Ion Ceban’s appeal against his ban on entering Romanian (and thereby the Schengen area). Mayor Ceban promised to appeal further in the courts. Vasile Tarlev and Natalia Morari have also appealed their bans and the cases are in the lower courts.

• The European Commission dispersed €189 million euros under the Reform and Growth Facility for Moldova. The decision recognizes Moldova’s implementation of 24 reform milestones and according to the Commission “This highlights the significant progress the country has made in advancing on its path to EU accession.” According to Prime Minister Munteanu:

“The money will be directed towards important projects for citizens: in the energy sector, to advance the construction of the regional hospital in Balti, to expand access to drinking water in several localities, to develop childcare services and support for young people entering the labor market. Moldova invests in people, and these projects will bring better conditions throughout the country,”

Politics - June 21st Elections in Gagauzia(?)

The People’s Assembly of Gagauzia held 2 extraordinary meetings on March 17th in order to deal with the region’s political crisis. Recall, the mandates of the representatives to the assembly expired last year and elections were scheduled for March 22nd. This has not happened because of a dispute between Comrat and Chisinau over the name of the autonomous region’s electoral body. Gagauzia calls it the Central Electoral Commission (CEC) while Chisinau says that constitutionally there is only one Central Electoral Commission (CEC) and that therefore the Gagauz body is the Central Electoral Council (CEC). Due to the expired mandates of the people’s assembly, and a recent law prohibiting legislation during the lame duck, they are unable to change the name (even if they were willing).

On March 17th the People’s Assembly tried to solve the impasse when they passed a resolution appointing 9 members titled “On Approving the Composition of the CEC.” They finally passed this resolution, and set the election date for June 21st, after many arguments - including a debate around whether this date was too close to the June 22nd anniversary of Nazi Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union.

The clever “everyone can see the acronym that they want” fudge may not be enough. Last week the Ministry of Justice appealed to the Constitutional Court (CC) asking for a review of the constitutionality of the region running its own elections at all. Therefore the first extraordinary meeting ended and everyone moved across the street to a larger venue for a second meeting. This one included guests like Igor Dodon and Irina Vlah and lots of discussion about how bad Chisinau is and some debate about whether they should even be negotiating with parliament at all. In the end, this meeting voted on a resolution calling on the Ministry of Justice with withdraw their appeal to the CC, and a second resolution appealing to Putin and Erdogan for mediation.

It remains completely unclear when the Gagauz elections will actually take place.

Crime & Corruption

Here’s a roundup of the top justice sector stories of the week:

• Dmitri Vartic is officially a suspect in his wife, Liudmila Vartic’s suicide. This was confirmed by Minister of Internal Affairs Daniella Misail-Nichitin. The authorities have questioned more than 30 people as they investigate the very public allegations of abuse, but no more details have been released. Dmitri Vartic has rejected accusations of abuse and has begun making police complaints against people he claims are defaming him.

• Anti Corruption Prosecutors have accused former Moldovan Ambassador to Sweden, Norway, Finland and Iceland (one post), Liliana Guțan, of embezzlement. They accuse her of falsifying accounting records and using public money for personal expenses to the tune of 275,927 lei. Guțan denies the accusation and claims that they are a political conspiracy to remove her from her post (she was removed in April 2025).

• Updates on alleged serial killer Stepan Găină. After a psychological evaluation the court found Găină to be sane and fit to stand trial. The investigation is ongoing but police report that they have finished the DNA examination of human remains. Publicly, the authorities have suggested that there are up to 6 victims killed by Găină and fed to his pigs.

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Like the rest of Europe, Moldovans have spent the last week watching the unfolding war against Iran and trying to figure out the basics. Why? why now? and what does this mean for us? While the first 2 questions seem as opaque now as they were the first day, the question about the impact on Moldova and the rest of Europe is becoming more clear.

The closure of the Strait of Hormuz has led to skyrocketing oil prices. With Gulf states unable to load oil and LPG onto tankers they have filled up their storage and begun gradually shutting down production. The longer the war lasts the harder it will be to restart this production. With analysis saying that this is already the largest oil shock in history (with the potential to dwarf 1973 and 1979) it is clear that the crisis could have a long tail.

Russia has emerged as an early winner in this war as the rising price of oil replenishes their exhausted war chest and the Trump Administration begins “temporarily” dropping sanctions against Russian energy. Meanwhile, peace negotiations in Ukraine have frozen as the real estate investors tasked with finding peace have refocused their efforts on the Middle East.

Incredibly, the United States and Gulf nations expended more Patriot Missile interceptors in 3 days than have been used by Ukraine since 2022. The US has long argued that it needed to limit the provision or sale of Patriot interceptors to Ukraine so that the country could maintain stocks for a potential conflict with China. Now, with US stocks rapidly depleting and Arab Gulf states running dangerously low on interceptors, they have turned to Ukrainian experts to help them with a more cost effective drone and missile defense.

None of this is good for Ukraine that it itself dangerously low on interceptor missiles. Meanwhile, the Pentagon has said that it is “not concerned” about reports that Russia is aiding Iran in targeting American ships and bases.

Moldova Braces for an Oil Shock

Right now Moldova does not face shortages of gasoline or diesel fuel, but worries have set off panic-buying that is causing lines and emptying gas stations. The EU requires all member states to maintain emergency oil stocks equivalent to 90 days of imports of 61 days of consumption. Moldova has no such oil reserves and the Ministry of Energy has estimated that commercial reserves could cover 21 - 30 days of supply.

The government declared a 60 day State of Alert1 in the energy sector but warned the public against panic-buying and noting that the conditions to not warrant a full State of Emergency at this time.

The Ministry of Energy has proposed a draft law this week to create 90 day reserves with the government responsible for 50% of the total and private companies responsible for the other 50%. The proposal states that 60% of the reserves would need to be kept in-country. The new law targets diesel, gasoline and aviation fuel and would gradually fill a reserve until July 1, 2030.

Moldova has seen some small fuel prices increases as regulators easy the price up while monitoring the direction of events.

Transnistria faces a more acute crisis as the attack on Iran immediately disrupted their natural gas supply2. On March 4th the region’s MGRES power plan switched operations to coal in order to conserve natural gas. The regional “authorities” have instituted a gas saving regime by cutting off heat to non-essential buildings.

The ongoing crisis and manifest uncertainty across Europe is only likely to further drive Moldova’s renewable transition. This week the authorities reported that Moldova covered 24.5% of its electricity consumption in 2025 with renewable power. The country ended the year with 980 MW of installed capacity, up from 77 MW in 2020. Of that 980 MW, 400 MW was installed in 2025 alone.

Other International Affairs News

Here’s a roundup of the other top international affairs stories of the week:

• Moldova and Ukraine resolve a trade dispute after exchanging heated words. The issue started recently when Moldova’s health department (ANSA) detected the antibiotic metronidazole in chicken feed that had been imported from Ukraine. This caused a suspension of all poultry import from Ukraine subject to lot by lot testing for banned substances. Ukrainian authorities claimed that the situation was blown out of proportion and publicly suggested that they might retaliate by banning Moldovan wine. After much back and forth Moldova’s Minister of Economy Eugene Osmochescu announced that nothing will be banned and the countries are working together on new testing processes.

• Far-right parties gather in Washington DC for the “Alliance of Sovereign Nations.” The event, which took place from March 4-6 was attended by Moldovan MP Vasile Costiuc, leader of the Democracy at Home (PPDA) party. The event was organized by MAGA Congresswoman Anna Paulina Luna with the support of Turning Point USA. It featured Speaker of the House Mike Johnson as the keynote speaker. Other speakers included George Simion and members of Georgian Dream and AfD. At the event Costiuc posted selfies with various attendees and wrote about the event’s opposition to globalism and support of “national sovereignty.”

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Politics - a Week of Scandals

Outside of the international uncertainty, attention in Moldova this past week has focused on 2 “scandals,” the first involving a change in the laws for justice reform, the second involving the tragic suicide of the wife of a local PAS leader. Let’s jump in.

The Fight Over Herman von Hebel

The first scandal centered on the PAS party’s nomination of Herman von Hebel to the Prosecutor’s Evaluation Commission. This is the body responsible for vetting prosecutors and is the next major step in the planned justice reform process. Von Hebel was previously the international chair of the Pre-Vetting Commission and in that role drew lots of attacks from opposition parties.

On March 5th parliament voted to appoint von Hebel to the commission where he got 53 votes of the required 61. PAS MPs then abruptly voted to change the law on vetting to reduce the required threshold to a simple majority (51 votes) for members of the commissions proposed by international development partners. This law was passed with 55 votes. Following this, 53 PAS MPs voted to appoint Herman von Hebel and Bernard Lavigne to the Prosecutors Evaluation Commission. All opposition factions opposed this move and vowed to appeal to the Constitutional Court.

The move, which included slipping the amendment in an unrelated bill and passing it directly in the second reading, drew widespread condemnation. Many prominent civil society organizations, including the Legal Resources Center (LRJM), the Promo-LEX Association, the Institute for European Policies and Reforms (IPRE), Amnesty International Moldova, the Soros Foundation Moldova, Transparency International – Moldova and the Contact Center, all signed a letter of concern. It stated (in part):

“The legislative change was promoted in an accelerated manner, without real public consultations and by introducing an amendment to a draft law with a different objective. At the same time, the urgency argument invoked for adopting the change is not legally proven, and the existing legal framework already contains mechanisms designed to prevent potential blockages in the work of the evaluation committees”

Vadim Vieru, Promo-Lex program director, said of the situation:

“This is not reform, it is the reflex of a majority that prefers to change the rules of the game rather than play by them”

**Ilie Chirtoacă of Tte Legal Resources Center of Moldova said:

“It is an absolutely regrettable decision, because it is not justified, it was not consulted and I think it will serve as a rather bad signal for the European Commission,”

Valeriu Pașa, President of Watchdog stated:

“Changing the law on the vetting commission with such speed, promulgated by the President without lifting her foot off the accelerator, is a very bad example.”

Responding to the criticism, President Sandu stated:

“In this Parliament, there are not 61 deputies who support justice reform. There are not. If you disagree, you can give me names. Beyond the parliamentary majority, who would be the other deputies who support justice reform? We can analyze their statements and the actions of the opposition – they do not support justice reform. So, by definition, it is not possible to have 61 votes in this Parliament. In the previous Parliament, they existed because the parliamentary majority ensured 61 votes and then it was not a problem. (…) We are not talking about changing the Constitution here, we are only talking about appointing members to the Vetting Commission.”

For his part, Herman von Hebel stated that he’s looking forward to getting to work.

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The Death (Femicide?) of Ludmila Vartic

The second scandal of the week involved the tragic suicide of Ludmila Vartic, who allegedly jumped from the 11th story of a Chisinau apartment building on March 3rd. The case became public on March 8th, International Women’s Day, when the NGO National Coalition “Life Without Violence” posted the following on facebook:

“Last night, the Coalition was notified via a post that another woman died as a result of violence.

Her name was Ludmila.

Ludmila’s death was no accident. It was the result of continuous abuse, humility and control.

Her husband abused her, degraded her, limited her access to her own children and ultimately left her homeless, without support and without safety. This man pushed her to death.”

The post went on to describe the death as “femicide,” define the term for readers and call on people in trouble to reach out to their network members to assistance.

This post immediately went viral, driven by the overlap with Women’s Day and the fact that Ludmilla’s husband was Dumitru Vartic, vice president of the Hincesti District Council and member of PAS.

President of the Council, Nicoletta Moroșanu, immediately called for his resignation saying that she acted not based on an assumption of guilt but that given the seriousness of the situation “maintaining an important public position in such circumstances is not appropriate.”

This was followed by a call by Doina Gherman, Vice President of Parliament, and the local PAS party in Hincesti moving to expel him from the party. Dumitru Vartic initially made a facebook post which was a mournful dedication to “Ludmila – the one who was Mother, Wife, Daughter and Friend.” He later deleted the post as the story went viral.

Dumitru Vartic resigned on March 9th.

What we (don’t) know…

At the time of writing the only concrete “evidence” that Dumitru Vartic abusively drove his wife to suicide came from that one facebook post from the National Coalition “Life Without Violence,” which itself said that they were “notified via a post.” The NGO later followed up noting all the various government agencies, politicians and police departments that have jumped into the case since they first posted - saying that they will monitor everyone’s work so that “justice will be done.”

Meanwhile, lots of social media posts swirled with rumors of rapidly arranged burials, skipped autopsies and similar claims of coverups. As near as we can tell none of those are true.

Here’s what we know, the police have now opened 2 criminal cases - one investigating her death in Chisinau and another in Hincesti looking into her husband. National Police Chief Viorel Cernăuțeanu stated that the police were unaware of any reports of domestic violence prior to her death and that contrary to rumors, police on the original scene acted according to protocol. He also said:

“It’s important to understand: if the victim remains silent, that doesn’t mean society should remain silent. Many are currently discussing what happened in this family. It’s a shame we’re only talking about this now, and not at an earlier stage, when social services, psychological support, and safety measures could have prevented the tragedy,”

The police have said that there was a suicide note but that it is being withheld to protect the couple’s minor children.

Social services announced that they were monitoring the situation with Ludmilla’s 2 children, but noted that the family was not previously on their radar.

The head of the Hincesti council, Nicoleta Morosanu, also noted that there were no previous complaints, either from Ludmilla or her relatives, that they were aware of.

For his part, Dumitru Vartic has not responded to requests for comment from many news outlets but told Nicoleta Morosanu that his wife was suffering from “professional burnout.” Ludmilla Vartic was a local Kindergarten teacher. He denies accusations of abuse and “femicide.”

This scandal has rocked Moldovan social media and politics. As far as I can tell, at the core there is a tragic death, and an accusation by a well respected coalition of NGOs without accompanying evidence or clear sourcing. National attention is squarely focused on investigating what happened and hopefully we’ll have more concrete updates next week.

Hybrid War Updates

Here’s a roundup of the top hybrid war stories of the week:

• A new Watchdog report shows a new coordinated social media campaign in support of Mayor Ceban. The campaign involves 10 facebook pages, 5 founded in 2023, 4 from 2024 and 1 from 2016, that engaged in a coordinated rebranding in order to launch Moldova targeted content. The pages were previously focused on specific cities in Romania such as Stiribraila.info (news from Braila) which changed its name to ObservatorulChisinaului (The Chisinau Observer). All the pages now promote Chisinau City Hall projects with a heavy emphasis on the mayor himself. One page dating from 2016 was previously reported to have been launched by groups affiliated with George Simion. All the pages are running paid promotions and appear to be violating META policy by not disclosing either that the content is political or who is paying.

• Moldova’s fugitives from justice in Transnistria have been located. The former president of the People’s Assembly of Gagauzia, Dmitri Constantinov, is staying at a friend’s apartment in the region, while other fugitives are in “more secure, more protected places” including a Russian military compound “under the protection of the Russian Federation.” This was reported by Moldova’s Chief of the National Police Viorel Cernăuțeanu. He noted that while the Moldovan authorities had located the fugitive members of the Shor network, they remained beyond the reach of the law.

• Former deputy Security and Intelligence Service (SIS) director is on trial in Romania for treason. Alexandru Bălan was arrested in September 2025 by the Romanian authorities and accused of passing state secretes to the Belorussian KGB. In the ongoing trial the authorities detailed multiple in-person meetings with KGB handlers as well as the use of email draft exchanges4 for secure communications. Bălan was appointed deputy director of SIS under Plahotniuc and served in that role until 2018.

USAID

Finally today, I want to applaud the recent episode of Last Week Tonight with John Oliver that focused on USAID. In a 30 minute takedown, Oliver focuses on the malicious stupidity behind the effort to feed USAID into the “wood chipper” and the merry band of conspiracy addled fools who have now caused hundreds of thousands of deaths - most of them children.

Back in February of last year I focused in on one of the main culprits of this event - Peter Marocco. Oliver talks about this truly odd character, but there is so much more. If you want to understand the “religious” motivation, petty vengeance, kidnapping plots, January 6th events and more that brought this man to a place of power over USAID - read my piece from last year.

USAID was imperfect - and the first people to tell you that would have been the people who worked there. But the agency did a huge amount of good around the world and provided Moldova critical support at some of the country’s lowest moments since independence. More importantly, in my experience, the people who worked there were in it for the right reasons and really really cared about their work helping others.

I can’t put into words how angry I remain at how the Trump administration maligned these people - calling them criminals or worse. Luckily, John Oliver found some good words so I’ll share those with you here.

34 Years Since the Transnistrian War

On March 2nd Moldova marks the Day of Memory and Gratitude commemorating those who died in the Transnistrian war. It’s not definitively known how many people died in the 4 months of war from March to July 1992, but estimates suggest 300 combatants and 400 civilians from the right bank1, and around 800 total from the left bank.

On the occasion President Sandu, Prime Minister Munteanu and Speaker of Parliament Grosu laid flowers at the statue of Stefan Cel Mare and then participated in the March of Remembrance through central Chisinau to the war memorial. There, they laid flowers at the statue “Mourning Mother” and President Sandu spoke to honor the sacrifice of the fallen and all veterans saying “The commemoration of the heroes of the war on the Dniester reminds us that freedom is not a given. It must be protected.”

She spoke of Moldova’s struggle for freedom and for the right of people to speak their own language and have their own traditions. Then, the President connected the events of 34 years ago with the present saying:

“We need to call things by their proper names.

In war, the aggressor is the one who attacks.

In 1992, the aggressor was Russia.

Today, in Ukraine, the aggressor is Russia.

To say that “both sides are guilty” is to falsify the truth. Moral neutrality in the face of aggression is not only cowardice, but also a lie. And solidarity between peoples who have experienced aggression is a duty.

The Republic of Moldova did not covet foreign territories. It did not start wars. It only defended its ancestral land.

And even today, the aggression against our country has not disappeared. Only the methods have changed.

If in 1992 aggression came with tanks, today it comes through propaganda, manipulation and disinformation. We are living a true cognitive war — a war that targets memory and identity. A war that tries to relativize responsibility, to confuse the aggressor with the victim.

Therefore, the defense of memory must be part of national defense.

Because the Day of Remembrance and Gratitude is not just about the past. It is also about the future. It is about the values ​​that define us. It is about our attachment to freedom, democracy and peace. It is about our natural place in the family of European states that value human dignity and the common good.

Knowledge of history and the sacrifices of ancestors is a condition for a strong state. Without memory, there is no identity. Without identity, there is no resilience. Without resilience, there is no security.”

Moldova Increases Pressure on Transnistria

On February 25th President Sandu signed a decree withdrawing the citizenship of 9 persons in Transnistria. This was done under Article 22(1)(c) of the Moldovan Constitution and the only official reason given was a referral from the Security and Intelligence Service (SIS). President Sandu’s National Security Advisor Stanislav Secrieru explained the move saying:

"The withdrawal of citizenship of the Republic of Moldova is a form of sanction for exercising functions within unconstitutional structures on the left bank of the Nistru River, for continuous actions to undermine the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the state, as well as for serious violations of the rights of citizens of the Republic of Moldova. These acts were committed in the interests of a foreign state that violates the neutrality of our country and is waging a war of aggression against the neighboring state of Ukraine."

All 9 persons named hold, or have held, senior leadership roles in Transnistria and at least 2 fought for the separatists during the war. Some were deputies in the “Supreme Soviet,” others were responsible for falsifying their elections as members of their “Central Election Commission” and others were members of the region’s security services and have been accused of human rights abuses.

Article 22(1)(c) allows for the withdrawal of citizenship in cases where a person commits acts deemed "exceptionally grave" that cause harm to the country’s sovereignty, territorial integrity, or national security. It has been used in recent years to strip citizenship of Moldovans who voluntarily fight in the Russian army in Ukraine. Previously, it was illegal in Moldova to strip citizenship from someone if the act would result in them becoming stateless. A carveout to this condition was introduced in December 2025 amendments to the citizenship law that allows citizenship to still be withdrawn for certain very serious acts.

It is unclear if the 9 persons in question also have Russian citizenship, or if they are left only with the universally unrecognized “Transnistrian citizenship.”

Moldova is Creating a Convergence Fund

The next day, PAS MPs proposed a bill to gradually remove tax exemptions for Transnistrian companies. The bill would initially target “socially non-essential” products such as alcohol, but would gradually expand. Chairman of the Economy, Budget and Finance Committee, Radu Marian, explained that the region now largely imports products via companies registered in Moldova. He estimated that equalizing the taxes for these companies would bring the state 3.3 billion lei (~€164 million euro) in additional revenue.

Starting on August 1st, 2026 this money would be directed into a “Convergence Fund” that will be used to fund the increased expansion of public services to Moldovan residents in the Transnistria region. Due to the region’s economic crisis, 2025 saw a 40% increase in social spending by the government in support of Transnistrian residents.

This week that economic crisis deepened as the Transnistrian “authorities” announced that from March 1st through December 31st the salaries of state employees will be paid in 2 installments2. They claim that this is a temporary measure.

1+1 Talks Resume

On February 26th Deputy Prime Minister for Reintegration Valeriu Chiveri met with Transnistrian “Foreign Minister” Vitali Ignatiev for the first 1+1 meeting in 10 months. The meeting was held under the OSCE mission framework.

Zona de Securitate journalist Irina Tabaranu explained that Chisinau’s message was blunt, if diplomatic. Deputy PM Chiveri explained the creation of the Convergence Fund as a mechanism for gathering internal and external financing to support reintegration. He also spoke of plans to expand social services including pilot programs to expand emergency 1123 coverage.

Additionally, Deputy PM Chiveri delivered Chisinau’s standard demands about allowing Romanian education, access for journalists and civic activists, free movement of people and farmers, etc.

New Details in Foiled Assassination Plot

Last week we got the first details in a story about how Moldovan and Ukrainian security services foiled an assassination plot against public figures in Ukraine. We now know that the 2 countries detained 12 people in connection with this plot which was orchestrated by Russian intelligence. Searches in the case were conducted in Chisinau, Kyiv and Odesa.

The organizer of the scheme along with 2 accomplices was detained in Moldova. Police report that he is a 34 year old Moldovan citizen who was recruited by the Russian security services while serving in a Russian prison. The Ukrainian authorities stated:

“After returning to Moldova, he supported pro-Russian groups whose activities were aimed at destabilizing the country and organizing mass protests in 2022-2023,

It has been established that the group planned to kill at least five Ukrainian government officials. These murders were intended to cause significant public outcry. The aggressor state intended to use this to destabilize the situation in Ukraine,”

This network recruited contract killers to travel to Ukraine and map out the habits and movements of a set of target individuals that included high ranking military personnel, leaders of state enterprises, Russian dissidents and at least one journalist who was reported to be Dmitry Gordon. The killers were to be paid up to $100,000 per kill depending on their seniority. Ukraine’s SBU released photos showing that at least one person detained there had an ID card from PGTRK (First Transnistrian) television channel, indicating that the individual was a Transnistrian “journalist.”

Nicolae Șepeli

This is the name of one of the men detained in Moldova and based on available information likely the organizer of the plot. Șepeli was sentenced to 11 years in prison back in November 2017 in Russia for attempted drug trafficking on a large scale. He was subsequently transferred to Moldova to finish serving out his sentence in a process that started in 2018 under the government of Prime Minister Pavel Filip.

In April 2022 President Sandu released him from prison on a probationary pardon. The fact that he subsequently went on to play an active role in the Shor network (fined for electoral corruption in December 2025) and then this scheme has drawn a huge amount of scrutiny towards the pardon process. As we wrote last week President Sandu revoked his pardon the day before he was detained.

Investigative journalists including those at ZdG have done extremely detailed reporting on this pardon process and mapped out the entire multi-year cycle. The entire story is too long to include in this newsletter but interested readers should visit the above link if they want all the details. In short, the sentence transfer process from Russia was standard and following it former Prosecutor General Alexandr Stoianoglo added Nicolae Șepeli’s to a list of people to consider for a pardon. The prosecutor’s office continued this after Stoianoglo was removed from office. The rationale was that a group of people from Moldova including Șepeli had been fraudulently brought to Russia on the promise of work as couriers and did not realize that they would be forced into trafficking illegal drugs (they were told it was be supplements).

The pardon recommendation was made with the support of human rights and anti-trafficking NGOs and was contingent on the Russian court also not knowing the circumstance at the time of original conviction. Of those recommended for a pardon Nicolae Șepeli was the only one accepted because he had no prior criminal record, served the majority of his sentence4 with a good behavior record and had a family willing to support him during his probation and reintegration.

As of the time of writing, no wrongdoing has been found or alleged at any stage of this process which involved officials appointed by all Moldova’s major political parties at one stage or another.

We’ll update in future editions if there is more information about the pardon process or about the operation to dismantle the contract killer network.

Politics

Here’s a roundup of the top political stories of the week:

• New IMAS poll shows dissatisfaction with the Munteanu government. Respondents were asked to rank the new government’s performance on a 1-10 scale with 10 being the best. 39% gave a grade of 1-4, 25% a grade of 5-6, 18% a grade of 7-8 and only 7% a grade of 9-10. 61% of respondents said that the Munteanu government has brought no changes, 17% said changes for the better, 14% change for the worse and 8% don’t know / no response.

• Vasile Tarlev’s Future of Moldova Party loses state funding starting in February. Prior investigations by the Central Election Commission (CEC) showed major financial violations in the 2024 presidential campaign and the party owes 587,500 lei to the state budget. The party does not have this money and has requested that their state funding be diverted to pay this debt which is now happening.

• Chisinau city hall has allocated 70 million lei for park & ride commuter lots. The new parking lots will be located in Ciocani, Buicani and Riscani and will allow commuters to drop their cars and proceed into the city on public transit. Explaining the move, the city noted that Chisinau is designed for 90,000 vehicles and currently has more than 400,000 vehicles registered in the city alone (not counting commuters).

Crime, Corruption & Justice Reform

Here are the week’s top stories in crime and justice:

• Plahotniuc’s court hearings on the “bank fraud5” case wrapped up the judicial investigation phase on February 26th. The court will reconvene on March 20th for closing arguments and then proceed to a verdict. In the last phase of the evidentiary trial the court heard testimony from a secret (anonymous) witness from inside Plahotniuc’s alleged criminal organization. This witness explained how the oligarch hired a Romanian consultant named Bogdan-Andrei Gheorghiu to build a web of shell companies collectively called UNIASIA HOLDINGS and how between 2013 and 2015 approximately $35 million dollar was transferred into this network. In 2016 Bogdan-Andrei Gheorghiu was arrested by the Romanian authorities but Plahotniuc got him out and arranged a fake Moldovan citizenship for him under the name Andrei Munteanu. The witness described the movements of 10s of millions of euros through the UNIASIA network and how Bogdan-Andrei Gheorghiu betrayed Plahotniuc and took control of these companies himself when the oligarch fled Moldova in 2019. The witness additionally explained complex schemes by which Plahotniuc acquired and maintained a €32 million euro yacht, a €40 million euro hotel in Spain a plane and more.

• Hassan Toper released and then re-arrested. Toper is alleged to be an accomplice to pre-meditated murder in the Summer 2024 “scoot by shooting” in Chisinau and was extradited from the UK to Moldova to stand trial. The court released him on house arrest over prosecutors objections creating a political scandal with MP Renato Usatii declaring “Long live reforms in the judicial system!” After 6 days of prosecutors appeals he was re-arrested.

• Major searches in a case involving the embezzlement of EU funds. Anti-corruption police (CNA) conducted searches in Causeni, Singerei, Soroca, Soldanesti, Edinet, Taraclia, Straseni, Glodeni and Chisinau targeting local public authorities, the “National Office for Regional and Local Development” and a company in Chisinau. 5 people were detained. The case involves contractor(s) offering kickbacks in exchange for winning road and sewage system construction tenders. The contractors would later bribe inspectors and engineers to get their shoddy work accepted. In one phone intercept, conspirators discussed cutting the material deliveries in half and laying 6-8 cm of asphalt instead of the required 10. Works were financed through the “European Village” program supported by the National Office for Regional and Local Development with “national and foreign” infrastructure funds.

• CNA searches in a second case of “embezzlement of foreign assets” targeted the Moldsilva Agency. The forestry agency was implementing a project called the “National Forest Expansion and Rehabilitation Program.” The CNA alleges fictional employee contracts totaling more than 4 million lei and the use of public funds for private purchase by Moldsilva employees. Environment Minister Gheorghe Hadjder announced the subsequent firings of the section heads of Moldsilva in Chisinau, Ghidighici, Vadul lui Voda, and Criuleni as well as many lower level employees. He said that firings will be followed by prosecutions. Explaining the origin of the case the Minister stated:

“Following inspections at the Ghidighici and Criuleni forestry units, where over 1,000 trees were illegally felled, we ordered internal audits at all forestry enterprises. As a result, inspectors recorded numerous violations. And it’s not just illegal logging; there are also unaccounted surpluses, unjustified expenses, and work that’s just on paper. We will not tolerate corruption, which is why dismissals and sanctions have followed,”

Economics and Infrastructure

Here’s a roundup of the top economics stories of the week:

• The US Supreme Court decision brings Moldova’s tariff rate down to 10%6. This is a major reduction from the “Liberation Day” rate of 25%. The Moldovan government is monitoring how the US implements these changes and notes that the new legal justification for the tariffs is (theoretically) temporary and expires in 150 days. In 2025 Moldova’s trade with the US grew 8.6% to $244.9 million dollars with the vast majority of Moldova’s exports the the US being wine (62%).

• PAS MPs have introduced a bill in parliament to mandate the labeling of the country of origin for products in the supermarket. The current law mandates that this information be public, but it is often hidden in the fine print. The new law would require the country to be listed on the price tag, which could include a flag, so that shoppers can easily opt for local products. Chairman of the Economy, Budget and Finance Committee, Radu Marian believes that this initiative can increase sales of local products by 5-15% and said that “It is an initiative through which we want to transform a simple act - daily shopping - into an engine supporting the national economy.”

The Munich Security Conference

Compared to last year’s Munich Security Conference, the 2026 event was far less shocking to participants. Partly, that’s because US Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s speech was far less abrasive1 than the one delivered last year by JD Vance. Partly, it’s because the shock of the recent Greenland Crisis has been internalized and it’s getting harder for the US to shock European leaders.

President Maia Sandu was one of the more than 50 heads of state and government attending the event. There she spoke on a panel about hybrid threats sharing Moldova’s experience and warning that hybrid attacks affect all countries now - big and small. On the sidelines of the event she gave an interview to Romanian Substack news platform Explicativ where she called out “cognitive warfare” as the most dangerous threat to democracies and highlighted the role and power of social media companies saying:

“The Republic of Moldova is too small a country to be able to impose rules on platforms. And platforms must have a degree of responsibility, because they decide which algorithms they use. These algorithms bring information to our screen thousands of times to form an opinion. But that is not freedom of expression,”

At the conference President Sandu had numerous bilateral meetings, including one with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Speaking about their discussion she said that she expressed gratitude to the United States for past an ongoing support - particularly in the field of energy projects. They also discussed American cybersecurity and defense support to the country.

Following the conference, Marco Rubio journeyed onward to directly involve the United States in Hungary’s elections where he spoke of a “golden era of relations between our countries” and told Viktor Orban that “President Trump is deeply committed to your success.”

Meanwhile, a Congressional Delegation (CODEL) of 4 Democratic Senators, Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Chris Coons (D-DE) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) stopped in Chisinau on a tour of the region.

While in Chisinau the Senators met with President Sandu and Prime Minister Munteanu.

In questions and statements the Senators explained to the Moldovan press that the country is not unique in not having a US Ambassador with Senator Coons saying:

“I see our relations as close and strong. You should not misunderstand the lack of an ambassador here. We lack ambassadors in many countries”

They spoke of the Trump Administration’s support for energy projects in Moldova as evidence that a strong strategic relationship exists. Senator Blumenthal strongly condemned Putin’s war of aggression and praised Ukraine and Moldova’s “commitment to democracy.”

RISE Investigation Identify’s Shor’s Aircraft Fleet

RISE Moldova released 2 investigations this week into the financial dealings of Ilan Shor and his close proxies. The first investigation showed that starting in Spring 2024 Ilan Shor began acquiring a fleet of aircraft, starting with a AgustaWestland AW139 helicopter. This was followed by a Gulfstream G650ER, a Gulfstream G450 and another Gulfstream G650ER.

To evade sanctions, members of Shor’s network loaned money to the Turkish private jet rental company Zafer Air. These loans were not repayable in cash, but were to be redeemed for the aircraft at some future date. Zafer Air operates 12 aircraft of which 4 are Shor’s. RISE tracked the planes as largely flying to Ankara, Moscow, Istanbul, Tel Aviv, Bishkek and Abu Dhabi. Other trips included Budapest, Riga, Brussels, Vienna, Barcelona and Tokyo.

Intriguingly, for many of these flights the planes were painted with the official name and symbols of the Kyrgyz Republic and used to ferry the President of Kyrgyzstan Sadyr Japarov to official visits.

On of the flights on March 2-7 2025 overlapped with Ilan Shor’s birthday and went to the Maldives. RISE quotes the Moldovan authorities as having received no information from Interpol that Shor left Russia since he arrived there from Israel in February 2024.

In their second investigation, RISE reported on recent data leaks from Russia’s sanctioned PSB bank that showed top Shor lieutenant Marina Tauber held more than $500,000 dollars cash equivalent in the bank. Tauber did not report such holdings on her asset declarations before she fled the country ahead of her 7 year 6 month prison sentence for money laundering and other crimes. RISE reports that the bank’s 21% interest rate is providing her with healthy yearly returns. Ilan Shor was also found to have an account in the bank with the equivalent of $87,000 in cash.

Other Security & Hybrid War News

Here’s a roundup of the other top security stories of the week:

• Dmitri Constantinov doesn’t “want to go to prison.” The former President of the People’s Assembly of Gagauzia thus explained why he is on the run from the law in a newly released video. He called his recent 12 year prison sentence for embezzling more than 46 million lei “unfair” because the word “embezzlement” implies the theft of public funds and he was actually convicted of stealing this money from a private company - a situation he calls an “an economic dispute between private entities.” Constantinov is wanted by police and assumed to be in the Transnistria region after he escaped with a network of accomplices - changing cars at least 3 times - the day before sentencing.

• The authorities announced a joint Moldovan-Ukrainian investigation into a Russian plot to assassinate Ukrainian public officials. Few details are available at the time of writing, but we know that one of the targets of the investigation was a Moldovan citizen named Nicolae Andrei Șepeli. He was previously convicted of an unspecified crime in Russia before being transferred to finish his prison sentence in a Moldovan prison. He as pardoned by President Sandu in April 2022 on the recommendation of the Prosecutor General and Commission on Issues of Pardoning Convicted Persons. This pardon was conditional on a sort of parole agreement and has been canceled citing new information2.

Dodon’s “Kuliok” Trial Continues

Vladimir Plahotniuc has refused to testify in ongoing court proceedings against Igor Dodon in the case that has been nicknamed “kuliok” (bag). The case stems from a secretly recorded video, presumably by Plahotniuc himself, showing a discussion between himself and then President Igor Dodon in 2019. In the video, Plahotniuc passes Dodon a black bag with the implication that it contains money. Recall that Vladimir Voronin, when it appeared he was being forced out of politics last summer, told the world that the bag contained €860,000 euros.

During court hearings, long portions of the video not involving the bag were played for the first time. They involve a negotiation between Dodon and Plahotniuc about the formation of a governing coalition in the wake of the 2019 parliamentary elections. Plahotniuc, then leader of the Democratic Party, asks Dodon for his terms and Dodon stipulates that there will be 2 coalition agreements:

1. The Secret Agreement - to be signed between Plahotniuc and Dodon at the Russian Embassy in the presence of the Russian Ambassador.

2. The Public Agreement - to be signed by the Democratic Party leader (Plahotniuc) and the Socialist Party leader (Zinaida Greceanîi) and released publicly.

While the public agreement divided up ministries and created power-sharing working groups, the secret agreement involved Federalization. This almost certainly referred to the reintegration of Transnistria via the constitutionally asymmetric Kozak Memorandum3. Dodon explained that “The word federalization is a problem for us too. I explained it to Putin and Putin agreed,” and the 2 men agreed to use the term “special status.”

In parallel, Plahotniuc asked for assurances that criminal cases against him opened in Russia would be closed. Dodon stated that Putin had invited Plahotniuc to Russia under his “personal guarantee” in order to discuss this. Plahotniuc asked for assurances that did not involve him going to Russia, to which Dodon replied that Dimitri Kozak insists on the coalition agreement coming first.

Dodon additionally discussed party financing, with the clear implication that he was referring to Plahotniuc financing the Socialist Party, where he said “For us, 600-700 per month,” adding that this will increase “up to 700-800.” Plahotniuc expressed some surprise at this number, and Dodon insisted that “If you want to change something, I have to consult with Moscow.”

Note: Plahotniuc’s refusal to testify reflects his right against self incrimination as he is also a defendant in a related case that has not yet been brought to court.

Other Crime, Corruption & Justice News

• Police increase the suspected body count of the Beriozchi serial killer. The crimes, which were first announced on Christmas Eve, are still being investigated as the police process the alleged killer’s sprawling pig farm. Chief of Police Viorel Cernăuțeanu answered questions about progress stating:

“Active investigative measures are currently underway, which will undoubtedly further shock society. We’re talking about events from 2005-2008, 2015, and 2018, when the suspect committed quite serious crimes. Without going into details, the investigation has already clearly identified three victims. Three more victims are under investigation,”

• Interpol has refused to issue a Red Notice for Denis Cuculescu who was recently convicted of fraud and treason. The agency cited their rules against getting involved in political or security related prosecutions as the reason. Moldovan police are reapplying and attempting to negotiate, focusing on the fraud conviction.

• Vlad Filat announced that Interpol dropped their Red Notice against him. This was confirmed by the Moldovan police but the reason is unclear. The warrant involved Filat’s recent prison sentence in France.

• Anti-Corruption Prosecutors announced a new criminal case against Plahotniuc regarding the use of false identity documents. This will be his 6th ongoing criminal case in Moldova and the 3rd international case involving his many identities discovered when he was arrested in Greece (the other cases are in Greece and Romania)

The Conflict over the Dereneu Church

A conflict between the Moldovan Orthodox Church (under Moscow) and the Romanian Orthodox Metropolis of Bessarabia (under Bucharest) over a church in the town of Dereneu has spilled into national politics. Back in 2018 the parish priest joined many other parishes around the country by defecting to the Metropolis of Bessarabia. This sparked a violent reaction, fueled by members of the Moldovan Orthodox Church and the local mayor who forcibly removed the priest and occupied the church. This case has spent years winding through the courts because the church building is state property. Ultimately, the Supreme Court of Justice ruled that parish choices and historical claims grant the right to use the building to the Metropolis of Bessarabia.

Forward to the present, Moldovan Orthodox Church Archbishop Petru of Ungheni and Nisporeni, lit the match when he and various priests and parishioners occupied parts of the church grounds and tried to celebrate mass earlier this month. They were joined by a growing mob that the government now says are primarily “organized” outside agitators unrelated to this small town. Socialist MPs have attended the protests and the police have had to intervene to prevent the mob from forcibly removing the parish priest and occupying the building.

This conflict has resulted in pictures and video clips being spread through Russian disinformation networks with claims that the Moldovan government is seizing churches or that a “Ukrainian scenario” is underway. Russian Foriegn Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has called this an “attack on Orthodoxy” and a stain on any claim that the West believes in human rights.

In other Orthodoxy news, Russian Patriarch Kirill awarded Transnistrian “President” Vadim Krasnoselsky the Order of Prince Daniel of Moscow, 2nd Class “for his contribution to the development of church-state relations.”

Other Political Updates

Here’s a roundup of the top politics stories of the week:

• Democracy at Home (PPDA) MPs Sergiu Stefanco and Ana Țurcan-Oboroc stole a car off a police impound lot in Cahul. They claimed that the car was seized as part of bankruptcy proceedings against a local farmer in violation of a law passed in late 2025 that suspended asset confiscations from farmers. The car belongs to a local party leader’s wife. The farmer then returned the car in less than an hour saying “I don’t want to break the law.” PPDA leader Vasile Costiuc praised his MPs “for their courage” and denied reports (and video evidence) that the man had immediately returned the car. The car was released the following day through normal legal procedure.

• The Ministry of Education launched a letter writing campaign on the 4th anniversary of the full scale war. The campaign is called “A letter in place of a hug” and encourages 6-12 graders to write a “simple and sincere letter, in which they convey a message of encouragement and hope” to their peers in Ukraine. Secretary of State Valentina Olaru stated that the letters don’t need to be “long or perfect” but that they should “come from the heart” and send the message “we are not indifferent.”

Economics & Infrastructure

Here’s a roundup of the top stories of the week:

• Moldova is planning a high-speed electric rail link Chisinau-Ungheni. Minister of Infrastructure Bolea stated that a feasibility study is starting with the goal of planning a 140 km / hr rail line of European gauge. This line would connect from the Chisinau airport through Ungheni to Bucharest. When Romania completes their Pașcani - Iași line then this link would connect Chisinau to the entire European high speed rail network.

• Questions swirl over the failure to complete the Vulcănești - Chișinău high voltage line in 2025. Politicians and ministers repeatedly claimed that the line would be put into use by December 2025 and have recently given contradicting answers as to what went wrong. President Sandu recently spoke in an interview explaining that while the power line is complete and has been tested the power stations at either end are behind their contractual deadlines. Minister of Energy Dorin Junghietu was forced to clarify that this isn’t really true. The contract deadline was never December 2025 but June 2026. He said that he made the public statements on the basis of verbal conversations he had where he urged the companies to complete the work faster - but that no such agreements were put on paper. When pressed he claimed that the contractors made “promises” but again, only verbally.

• Moldelectrica has hit a milestone - for the first time they have reported battery storage as an energy source. Currently 25 MWhs of batteries are installed but the Ministry of Energy predicts up to 200 MWh by the end of the year thanks to private investment. They note that new tenders for wind farms with 170 MW capacity are being prepared and that these tenders require 0.25 MWh of storage to be installed alongside every 1 MW of generation.

• Is the economy growing again? The National bank thinks so. They announced that GDP growth in Q3 of 2025 was 5.2%. They also announced that January inflation was 4.85% and within the bank’s target zone. The bank believes that the economy has now come out of stagnation.

• Parliament has voted to raise the VAT threshold for companies to 1.7 million lei. Ultimately, MPs sided with the government against proposals to further increase the threshold to 3.2 million.

• Economist Veaceslav Ionita has presented findings on the structural problems of the housing market in Moldova. He cites lack of housing supply driven by regulatory problems and poor financial instruments for builders as the driver of the ever-increasing housing prices in Chisinau. Specifically, he cites a 0.5% fee on the total project cost that is required to even start building. This means that a €100 million euro apartment building would have a €500,000 euro fee just to begin construction - much higher than in other parts of Europe. In terms of financing he notes that bank loans for real estate have exploded from 3.7 billion lei in 2015 to 29.4 billion lei in 2025 with half of this difference coming in the last 2 years. Critically, while around 70% of financing for new housing construction used to come in the form of loans to construction companies, today that figure is only 10% with the majority of lending going directly to households. Construction companies are unable to access cheap financing so they sell apartments in unbuilt projects in advance of construction and individual households make these purchases and wait 5-7 years to either move in or flip the completed property for up to 3x profit. This contrasts with an EU average of 50-70% of residential construction financing coming from bank loans offered at lower than mortgage rates. Since subsidized prima-casa mortgages cannot be spent on buildings that are unfinished this means that state money is subsidizing purchases on a supply constrained market and further driving up the price.

Here are some key comparisons between the Transnistria region and the rest of Moldova1:

Additionally, industrial output from Transnistria has fallen 30% in a single year. The region is now operating at 75% of their 1989 industrial output.

Veaceslav Ioniță estimates that 60% of the region’s economic activity relies on Russian gas. On February 5th the MGRES power station switched over from natural gas to coal. No reason was given and they switched back to gas on Monday February 9th. The interruption implies continued difficulties getting deliveries of Russian gas. Transnistria now has an extremely limited emergency supply of coal after last winter’s long crisis. They are unable to resupply as the coal required comes from a specific mine in the Donbas under Russian occupation.

Looking at the big picture, Ioniță explained the depth of the crisis writing:

“In 2025, the left bank of the Dniester River entered the deepest economic and social crisis in at least the last 25 years. Industry has collapsed, GDP has fallen dramatically, exports are at a historic low, and the population - both employees and pensioners - lives worse than a decade ago. All these developments show an extremely complicated situation, unprecedented for the region”

I’ve written before about how the inherent contradictions in the Transnistrian economic and governance model have become impossible to reconcile. Now we are starting to see clear indications of the structural collapse of the region’s economy.

In parallel, human right’s NGO Promo-Lex reports a sharp deterioration of human rights in Transnistria in 2025. They particularly cite total control of the information space, increased propaganda, militarization of eduction - with specific focus on disabled children and those in institutions - and inhumane conditions in detention facilities.

The region’s “authorities” are pushing for even more control of the information space and have rolled out their own messaging app this week called IDC Matrix. Transnistrian “President” Krasnoselsky has urged people not to use “imported apps” claiming that IDC Matrix is safer. Journalists who have tested the app have shown that there is no end to end encryption - meaning that all messages are available to the operator.

Other Security News:

Here are the other top security stories of the week:

• Another Russian drone crashed in Moldova. The authorities confirmed this one was also a Gerbera model without a warhead. It crashed in the village of Sofia in the Drochia district.

• Moldova was ranked 5th globally in cybersecurity. The annual ratings, called the National Cyber ​​Security Index (NCSI), from Estonia’s E-Governance Agency, listed the top 5 countries as the Czech Republic, Canada, Estonia, Finland and Moldova. Foriegn Minister Mihai Popșoi called the ranking “proof that Moldova is becoming a safe and resilient digital hub.”

Prime Minister Munteanu Visits Kyiv

The Prime Minister led a delegation including Minister of Energy, Dorin Junghietu, Minister of Internal Affairs, Daniella Misail-Nichitin, Minister of Infrastructure Vladimir Bolea, and State Secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Sergiu Mihov. In Kyiv they met with their counterparts and announced various joint projects including a new bridge across the Nistru at Cosăuți-Imapol2. In joint remarks with Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko, Prime Minister Muntean stated:

“My special attitude towards Ukraine is well known, given that I have lived here for more than 20 years. As Prime Minister, on my first visit to Ukraine, I returned with respect and solidarity towards the Ukrainian people, who are on the front lines in defense of peace and human values”

He expressed strong support for Ukraine and presented a new humanitarian package from Moldova. This package, valued at over €700,000 euros, includes emergency vehicles, generators, medical supplies and food.

Prime Minister Munteanu also visited the Wall of Remembrance of the Fallen for Ukraine and met with President Zelenskyy. Following their meeting, President Zelenskyy wrote on facebook:

“During the meeting with the Prime Minister of the Republic of Moldova, Alexandru Munteanu, bilateral projects between our countries were discussed. Energy, railways, infrastructure - everything must be implemented.”

Thank you for your support for Ukraine and our people. We have a common vision of the future in the European Union, and the path of Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the EU must be common, so that all residents of our region benefit from the strengthening of our peoples and Europe as a whole,”

Other International Affairs Stories

Here’s a roundup of the other international news of the week:

• Maia Sandu on her nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize. President Sandu responded to questions this week on her nomination speaking in the context of the news of a new prisoner exchange between Ukraine and Russia saying:

“I’m grateful that people are watching our country, that they appreciate our courage and resilience, but there are many people nominated for this award.

Today I looked at the Ukrainians who returned home from Russia, and these are the people who deserve the Nobel Peace Prize. These are the people who sacrifice their lives for peace, because they want to bring peace back to their country, to their villages, to their cities, and to our continent,”

• Politico - the EU plans to bring Ukraine into the block in 2027. The outlet reports that EU leaders are working on a plan for a “multi-speed” Europe that they are calling “reverse enlargement.” Under this idea, Ukraine, and theoretically Moldova and other candidate countries, would be brought into the EU before negotiations are fully complete. The countries would start as members with limited voting rights and limited responsibilities. They would then complete the qualifications for full membership and phase into full membership. The idea is to make membership inevitable and allow a solid timeline to be incorporated into draft peace proposals supported by the United States. This idea is opposed by Germany but being pushed by France, Italy, Poland and others. The plan outlines 5 steps for implementation which are all focused on neutralizing the veto from Hungary. Viktor Orban stated this week that Ukraine is an “enemy” of Hungary and vehemently opposes Ukrainian membership in the EU. The plan envisions an unofficial negotiations process, where Ukraine works through negotiating clusters and reforms even as Hungary opposes officially opening these clusters. Then, they wait for Orban to leave - ideally by losing the Hungarian elections in April. If that fails, they plan to lean on Trump to force Orban to support the agreement in the context of a peace treaty. As a final option, Hungary’s voting rights can be suspended under EU Article 7. Politico quoted an unnamed Moldovan official’s reaction saying that Moldova…

“wants to join a European Union that functions effectively beyond 27 member states, and we welcome discussions on the internal reforms needed to make this possible.” (…) [but]

“full membership - with equal rights and full participation in EU decision-making - must remain the clear and final destination.”

Author’s Note: If you are interested in following the Hungarian election with coverage in English I strongly recommend the “Days Until Hungarian Elections” substack. Written by veteran journalists they detail both the campaign as well as the major election interference being conducted by the Kremlin to force a pro-Orban outcome.

Days Until the Hungarian Elections

Weekly analysis on the upcoming historical Hungarian elections by Denník N and Napunk.

By Veronika Munk

Hybrid War Updates

Here are the top stories in the Kremlin’s hybrid war against Moldova from the week:

• Watchdog reports another connection between the FSB and Mayor Ion Ceban. Their investigation shows that FSB affiliate Nidjat Askerov held an “assistant” badge giving him access to the Chisinau Primaria (city hall). Askerov has been documented as working alongside FSB agent, and Ceban campaign consultant in 2019, Iurii Gudilin. ZdG has previously reported that Gudilin worked with Askerov to provide financing to the MAN party “like the PSRM” (Socialists) with a total of €600,000 euros per month. Askerov also recently appeared in the treason trial of Denis Cuculescu, who claimed that Askerov recruited him as an FSB asset to funnel this money into Moldova via crypto and other illicit schemes. Mayor Ceban’s people deny this and claim that the “assistant” badge was fabricated with AI.

• One man and 2 women sentenced for preparing violent provocations and attempting to create mass public disorder. They were convicted in the context of the paramilitary training camps in Bosnia and Herzegovina that were organized by Russian agents and the Shor network. The trio was arrested while trying to cross back into Moldova with drones and incendiary devices. After arrest, the man was held for 12 months in pre-trial detention and then released as this is the maximum allowed by law. One of the women was released on judicial control, the other was released on house arrest in Tiraspol3. All have now fled and are now wanted. They were sentenced to 4 and 5 year terms.

• Lukoil no longer accepts credit cards. Gas stations in the Russian network have now been cut off by local banks which are implementing US sanctions against the company. For now they are trying to work in cash but the viability of the network is in real question as they await buyout offers for the parent company’s assets in Europe.

Political News

Here’s a roundup of the top politics stories of the week:

• Moldova may ban social media for children under 16. The government has announced the beginning of public consultations on the plan which Minister of Education Dan Perciun has called “very realistic.” The government envisions the start of a national conversation and consultations with the potential for a decision being made by the end of the year. President Sandu, speaking on the occasion of the global “Safer Internet Day,” called attention to the problems facing children saying:

“Our children are growing up in a very different world than the one we grew up in. Real, social life, with friends, colleagues, and family, is gradually being replaced by a networked life - inauthentic, without physical presence, without real relationships.”

• Moldova is represented by 5 athletes at the olympics. The team consists of 3 biathlon athletes and 2 cross country skiers. The flag was carried at the opening ceremony by skier Iulian Luchin.

• Gagauzia’s elections are tentatively scheduled for May 17. The Central Election Commission (CEC) is now in dialog with the People’s Assembly of Gagauzia to resolve issues with the election legislation in the region. The core problem is a pickle of the People’s Assembly’s own making. The CEC demands that they amend recent legislation that named the Central Election Committee of Gagauzia as the governing body for the vote. Because there can only be 1 CEC under the Moldova constitution this body must be renamed as the “Electoral Council.” Unfortunately, the People’s Assembly adopted legal amendments in 2024 that had 2 effects: 1) their term of office expires exactly 4 years after the last elections, and 2) they are unable to pass any legislation in the lame duck session. Now, with their terms expired in November they are unable to rename the commission / council and have frozen themselves in place. They are working on a technical solution (which I’ll leave in a footnote4) that will allow elections by May.

Crime, Corruption & Justice Reform

Here are the top stories of the week in the justice sector:

• Polls show people believe the justice sector is improving. The think-thank IPRE released a poll on “integrity in the justice sector” (full results in English) that showed 49% of respondents saying that the situation has improved in the last 3 years while 20% said that things got worse. 56% credit government actions with the improving situation. Of the remaining issues, 57% named corruption as the top problem, 15% cronyism and 15% unprofessionalism.

• Moldova slides slightly in Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index. In 2025 the country was ranked 80th of 182 countries and territories with a score of 42 points (0 means total corruption, 100 is no corruption). This is a slide from the 2024 rankings where Moldova was 78th with 43 points. Within the EU, both Bulgaria and Hungary are ranked worse than Moldova with 40 points. Moldova is tied with Kosovo and China. Romania was slightly better with 45 points and Ukraine worse with 36 (placed 104th). Transparency noted that the global average has fallen to 42 points - a 10 year low.

Prime Minister Munteanu has not put out any statements to mark the occasion and Newsmaker quotes him as calling the "first 100 days" milestone as "outdated" and "Soviet."

That last part is particularly confusing, as the tradition of using the first 100 days to frame an agenda and build momentum goes back to Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the start of the New Deal in 1933. It is very common around Europe and almost invariably marked by Moldovan Prime Ministers and Presidents1. It is particularly not Soviet as the leaders of that defunct empire spent no time considering limited terms of office, justifying their priorities to citizens or organizing a legislative agenda.

Just because the Prime Minister chose not to mark the milestone did not mean that it did not happen2. Various of news outlets ran summaries of the government’s 100 days, the MAN party protested on the occasion, the Communists gave speeches and President Maia Sandu was forced to answer questions in interviews about why the milestone was being ignored.

This was juxtaposed with 2 official press releases from the government on February 9th. In one, Prime Minister Munteanu bid farewell to the Ambassador of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to Moldova. In the other, he met with a relatively junior German MP.

I reached out to the new Government Spokesperson, Daniela Crudu, last Friday for comment on their 100 days. She didn’t respond until I pressed - asking if the answer was “no comment” on the evening of February 9th, at which time she asked for more time to answer my questions. At the time of writing I have not heard back.

Problems with Communication

Since coming into office Prime Minister Muntean and his team have struggled to communicate either their objectives or what they are working on. NM quotes economic expert Victor Ciobanu on the issue saying:

"Maybe some interesting ideas are emerging from the depths of the Ministry of Economy, but we don't know about them. The government is like a hedgehog in the fog. They seem to be doing something, but the details are unclear."

Government Spokesperson Daniela Crudu only recently took over the job after the post was vacant for nearly 3 months. In that time the Prime Minister’s team have succeeded in making him very active on TikTok, Facebook and Instagram Reels with short videos - including recent ones about snow removal and one this morning explaining that he and various ministers were off to Kyiv for official visits.

This has created a strange communications mix. On one hand, the new Prime Minister, who has no prior political experience or profile as a public figure, is quite present on social media. On the other, the lack of a spokesperson has meant that nothing approximating a clear messaging agenda has been put out since they took office.

Finally, what is most unusual is that the lack of clarity about what is going on is not just a public phenomenon. All last week I have had discussions with people and organizations that work closely with the government in various areas (civil society groups, NGOs, etc) who uniformly asked me what the government was going to announce at the 100 day mark?

They didn’t know, I had no answer and the apparent answer is “nothing.”

So taking as a fact that this has been a masterclass in how not to do political communications, let’s try and answer the question as best as we can and look at what happened in the last 100 days.

“100 Days of Foreign Policy”

Former Government Spokesperson Daniel Vodă published a post with his thoughts on the top accomplishments of the 100 days. He did so in his new capacity as an associate expert in foreign policy and strategic communications at the think-tank IPRE.

In his analysis he first cites as historic Moldova’s move to finally disentangle itself from the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). He goes on to note successful diplomacy in growing bilateral relationships both for Moldova’s economic development and security relationships. The only really concrete point he celebrates in this area was the recent $35 million dollars in support allocated by the United States for security assistance.

Vodă’s focus on international affairs is logical given his new position, but it further highlights the lack of clear talking points for the new government. The effort to withdraw from CIS has been ongoing since 2022 and is not complete. He specified that he made the post because Newsmaker had approached him for analysis. The unspoken implication was clear - after failing to get comment from the current government team, they reached out to the former spokesman.

The foreign policy framing may also be an attempt to just fill the blank with something. Experts who spoke to various news outlets pretty uniformly noted the lack of policy clarify on economic and domestic affairs. Speaking to Newsmaker, Victor Ciobanu called Minister of Economy Eugen Osmochescu's announcement of a Development Bank “important.” But we still have no details on what that is envisioned to be. The most visible actions in the last 100 days are around taxes - namely the revision / removal of the de minimis tax rate (targeting Temu) and the re-valuation of land values for property taxes. These could be important reforms, but in the case of the land valuation I have so far totally avoided it on Moldova Matters because it’s so unclear how it will turn out.

Economic expert Veaceslav Ioniță explained the tax moves more broadly saying:

“The government is facing a difficult situation: revenues are falling, while expenses are rising. The deficit is growing, and to correct the situation, revenues must be increased. This is precisely what the government is doing: finding ways to increase budget revenues. This is a noble goal, but it is being completely misrepresented. The government has very poor communication.”

The impression is one of many policies under discussion, but very little clarity as to what is going on and what the overall direction is.

What Does This All Mean?

Maybe nothing. The tradition of marking 100 days is totally artificial (if not Soviet in any way). It’s really not clear if there are big ideas and projects afoot that are not being communicated well… or not. Failing to talk about it on an arbitrary day isn’t necessarily an indicator one way or another.

It is however an indicator of a failing, or non-existent, political strategy. A simple press release (or facebook post) would have avoided a bad news cycle. Bigger than that though, is a real and widespread feeling that people do not know what this government is doing.

When pressed by a reporter on the 100 days, President Sandu responded:

“In 100 days, you cannot make a revolution in the economy. We are waiting to see a program, not necessarily a completely new one, because there is continuity, but with new elements that take into account the current context, in order to accelerate economic growth despite external and internal obstacles,”

So we are all still waiting.

On Saturday, January 31st 2026 the lights went out across most of Moldova. The time was 10:42 am. This was only the second such occurrence since the beginning of the full scale invasion of Ukraine, with the first being November 23, 2022.

Minister of Energy, Dorin Junghietu explained:

“Due to serious problems in the Ukrainian power grid, on the morning of Saturday, January 31, the voltage dropped on the 400 kV Isaccea-Vulcăneşti-MGRES line, causing the damaged disconnection of the power system.

The electricity transmission system operator, Moldelectrica, is working to remedy the situation, with voltage already restored in some localities,”

In Chisinau, Mayor Ceban called for calm and requested police take over traffic directions at intersections. With trolleybuses offline, people streamed into the streets wherever the busses happened to stop. At the same time, give that it was Saturday morning, things were quiet compared to the rush hour blackout in 2022.

Border crossings switched to generators and processed passports by hand until they were brought back online at around 4 pm. Hospitals and medical institutions also went to generators for critical systems and were also online by 3:40. By 3 pm Chisinau’s trolleys were starting to operate and by 4:30 most of the country was connected to the grid again.

During that time, backup generators kept all critical infrastructure operating, police responded to control traffic and dozens of people had to be rescued from stopped elevators. Emergency plans developed after the last outage, combined with light weekend traffic, meant that the outage was an inconvenience, not a disaster.

Still, power was out in much of the country for 4-6 hours….

What Happened?

To answer this question we need to refresh ourselves on Moldova’s electrical infrastructure situation.

While we don’t know exactly what the trigger was, it has been reported as an equipment failure / fault in Ukraine. This is likely due to Russian attack, or due to damage sustained in past attacks. In the map above, you see the Isaccea-Vulcăneşti-MGRES (MGRES is marked “Moldavaskaia TPP) 400 kV high voltage line in yellow. This is how electricity transits from Romania (EU grid) through Ukraine to Transnistria. From there it supplies the Odesa region in Southern Ukraine and Moldova.

A voltage drop on this line cause a cascading automatic disconnection of power stations all across Moldova (and presumably Southern Ukraine). Equipment that cannot survive below a certain voltage threshold disconnects automatically to prevent damage. This first took down all the green 300 kV lines, followed by the purple lines on the map above which are largely 110 kV regional lines. Below those, the 10 kV feeder lines disconnected themselves as well.

This made the Romania connection lines at Stinca, Tutora and Husi, seen above as purple lines crossing into Romania, go into “island mode.” This contingency had been tested and planned for but never used. Basically, those lines, which are normally inactive, begin supplying power to small “islands” of towns in Moldova within their vicinity. This way any parts of the country that could be directly supplied from Romania kept power due to the emergency plan.

Technicians restored power in basically the same order in which it went out: big lines to small ones. By 3:40 pm all the 110 kV lines were re-energized and local crews were bringing online the 10 kV feeders in stages.

In remarks after power had been restored, Minister of Energy Dorin Junghietu said:

“Today’s incident shows how important the interconnections with Romania that we are currently working on, Bălţi - Suceava, Straşeni - Gutinaş and, of course, Vulcăneşti - Chişinău, are. We thank the system operators in Romania and Ukraine for their operative interventions and cooperation,”

Recall: While Moldova is not reliant on Russia or Transnistria for electricity, it is reliant on high voltage lines that pass through both Ukraine and Transnistria. The government and international partners are working on 3 new high voltage lines to mitigate this risk:

• Vulcăneşti - Chişinău (seen above in red stretching south from Chisinau): This line has been completed and tested. It will be operational once the power stations on either end are completed and certified. It was funded by the World Bank.

• Bălţi - Suceava (seen above in red stretching west from Balti): Funded by the European partners1 this line is planned to be completed by late 2027.

• Straşeni - Gutinaş (not pictured, but between the 2 pictured red lines): The last of the 3 lines is fully funded by a US government grant of $130 million dollars. The timeline is not yet announced.

The Vulcăneşti - Chişinău line alone will be able to handle more than half of Moldova’s peak electrical consumption and will substantially guard against situations like the blackout from last weekend.

International Affairs & Security

Here’s a roundup of the top international affairs stories of the week:

• Maia Sandu was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. Norwegian MP and Green Party Leader Arild Hermstad nominated her citing Russian hybrid attacks and saying that “protecting institutions, transparency, and democratic elections is preventive peacebuilding.” Nominations for the Nobel Prize close on January 31st each year. Around 300-400 people are nominated yearly by the fairly large number of people who have the right to nominate anyone they please. From those a shortlist is compiled and a decision announced in October.

• The US will allocate $36.5 million dollars in security support to Moldova. This was announced by Moldovan Ambassador to the US Vlad Kulminski who stated that the funds would be used for “energy security, cybersecurity, resilience and other related national security priorities.” The ambassador noted that Moldova was among very few regional countries to receive any announcements of support from the US this year saying that it reflects “the level of trust and maturity of security cooperation between the Republic of Moldova and the United States.”

• The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) has banned the use of 1C in public institutions. For those of you lucky enough not to know, 1C is a Russian accounting program2. It has a near total monopoly on both private and public sector use in Moldova, Ukraine and many other former Soviet states. The SBU determined that putting all the nation’s finances through a Russian program was a risk. This has sparked a conversation in Moldova about the use of 1C as well as the use of Russian video conferencing software TrueConf, which is used for all remote court hearings.

Editor’s Note: I am aware that the US House of Representatives Judiciary Committee released an interim staff report that spends some time focusing on Moldova. The report, which basically ignores Russian election interference while claiming that the EU undemocratically manipulates elections, is “absurd and unfounded.” That was the official response of the European Commission, and I haven’t decided whether I’ll just go with that or whether I’ll dedicate an article to how Citizens United is being used to privilege corporate speech over both individuals and other nations sovereignty. I’ll get back to you on this one3.

Crime & Corruption

Plahotniuc “associate” Vladimir Andronachi was released from custody at the end of January. Andronachi had been in pre-trial detention as his trials for major corruption progress. ZdG does a great job explaining the mind numbing nuance of his release, but here’s the gist: The district court claims that the lead prosecutor missed the deadline for filing to extend his detention. They then released him for 30 days under judicial control with electronic monitoring. The prosecutor appealed, and the appeals court agreed that the prosecutor failed to make the deadline, but also dismissed the “judicial control with electronic monitoring” on another technicality meaning he’s just free to do whatever he wants. The prosecutor claims that the court illegally manipulated the filing deadlines due to the holiday schedule. He is being investigated by a disciplinary board now.

It’s a classic case of 2 courts and a prosecutor all “agreeing” officially that a dangerous criminal who is a flight risk should not be released… and blaming others for forcing their own hands in releasing him. We’ll see what comes next in the case, or if Transnistria gains one more oligarch this month.

Economics & Infrastructure

Here’s a roundup of the top economics stories of the week:

• The state has officially retaken control of Lukoil’s airport assets. Recall, that due to US sanctions the state took temporary control on November 12th of this strategic asset while paperwork was sorted out. Lukoil was required to officially ceed ownership by January 9th - but missed the deadline resulting in a 5 million lei fine. Now they have officially ceded ownership and paid the fine. Separate reports indicate that the American investment fund Carlyle Group is in negotiations to buy Lukoil assets outside Russia which would include the filling stations in Moldova. This deal still faces regulatory approval.

• Parliament has proposed an increase of the VAT registration threshold for small companies. Currently, once a company makes more than 1.2 million lei / year it must become a VAT payer (20% default rate). This means a major increase in taxes and accounting complexity. Parliament’s Committee on Economy, Budget and Finance has proposed raising this threshold to 3.2 million lei. The government has stated that they support a new threshold of 1.7 million lei - picked to align with EU norms. The 1.2 million threshold has been in place since the early 2010s, meaning that an absolute minimum new threshold to simply keep up with inflation would be around 2 - 2.4 million. Small companies have gotten disproportionately squeezed by inflation, but EU norms of keeping this threshold relatively low are likely to win the day. We’ll keep an eye on this story.

When compared to the last 10 years, Moldova is in the middle of an unusually cold winter. Snow that fell in early January is still on the ground and the capital’s lakes have frozen and provide space for a nice walk or a game of hockey.

But over the weekend the winter wonderland turned precarious as warmer temperatures began a snow melt and then quickly reverted - resulting in sheets of ice. Moldova does not have chemical treatments for roads and relies largely on sand. This worked well in high-traffic areas of Chisinau where the combination of lots of tires and the fact that asphalt is usually warmer than air temperature meant that most roads were ice free.

Not true for sidewalks and parking areas that are constructed of concrete pavers. These all froze solid into sheets. By the end of Sunday Chisinau’s emergency hospital set an all time record with 374 trauma injuries due to ice falls in a single day. This has continued since with medical personnel working long shifts and calls for people to put off non-emergency visits.

Chisinau initially closed schools on Monday but eventually extended this to the entire week with classes going remote. Balti did the same, and police suspended some intercity road travel in the north of the county. Truck traffic has been suspended at the border in some areas and the government declared that the start of any remaining classes and the workday itself would be delayed until 9 am all week.

Ice resulted in limited power outages in some villages and caused a fault at the Dubasari Hydroelectric Power Plant which resulted in a partial blackout of Dubasari and Corjova.

In spite of all of this strain, Moldova’s power grid and energy security situation is not showing signs of strain. Investments and lessons from past energy crises seem to have paid off in the first really cold winter since 2022. At the same time, the current situation in Ukraine is “close to a humanitarian catastrophe” according to Maxim Timchenko, director of the largest private power company in the country. With temperatures similar to, or colder than, Chisinau, 88,000 families in Kyiv had no power as of January 24th and Russian strikes continue to cripple Ukraine’s energy infrastructure.

Presidential Priorities for 2026

President Sandu gave a press conference about her priorities in 2026. Here is an overview of what she said:

Priority 1: Foreign Policy

“When international law no longer protects you sufficiently, you need to have good friends, to be part of alliances (...) Moldova’s foreign policy will be oriented towards firmly anchoring our country in credible partnerships with states that help each other in an increasingly hostile world”

Priority 2: Security

“A modern, capable, well-equipped army is fundamental for our development, peace and freedom”

The President proposed an increase in defense spending to 1% of GDP in 2026.

Priority 3 : Child Safety

The President spoke of 3 focus areas here - mental health in the digital age, drug prevention and physical health. Most of her remarks focused on mental health and how much time children are spending online. She discussed new school programs to teach digital hygiene.

Analysis: No mention was made of banning social media for minors, but given the shift in that direction in France and across much of the world the topic may come up for discussion this year.

Priority 4: Anti-Corruption and Justice Reform

“In recent years, several measures have been taken, complex and ambitious measures, some with better results, others that still need to be worked on and these results demonstrated. But it is important that we manage to build a system in which every citizen has confidence”

Priority 5: The Diaspora

She brought this priority back to security stating:

“One of the factors that makes people leave is the uncertainty related to Russia’s war in Ukraine.”

Speaking to the assembled journalists the President concluded saying:

“I know that these realities can create unease. Anxiety and uncertainty, concern for tomorrow—these affect the life of each and every one of us. But it is my duty to call things by their name, especially now, in moments like these. (…) We understand that we must press forward with even greater determination toward European integration. European integration is our anchor of safety in the face of an uncertain future,”

Emphasis mine.

Political Updates

Here’s a roundup of the other top political stories of the week:

• Olympic medalist Anastasia Nikita resigned from parliament. The PAS MP wrote on her social media that she was unable to juggle the work of parliament, being a mother and “remaining an athlete who still dreams of Los Angeles 2028.” The later was almost certainly the driving factor as rules against holding multiple jobs meant that she would have had to give up her athletic career while an MP. She joins 5 other PAS MPs who have resigned since the recent elections - most to pursue their former careers.

• Gagauzia’s elections for the People’s Assembly, scheduled for March, are now on hold indefinitely. The news comes amidst a political squabble between the autonomous region and the central government. According to Moldova’s electoral legislation (updated in 2022) Gagauzia appoints a Central Electoral Council to run their elections. This body is subordinate to the national Central Election Commission. In December 2025 the People’s Assembly voted to create their own Central Election Commission in defiance of the law, actions which led to the Supreme Court of Justice suspending this “commission.” What appears on its face to be a semantic argument is really a case of the national government seeking to bring the region back into line after years of Shor control and mass electoral corruption1. On January 25th anti-government protests “In Defense of Gagauzia” took place in the autonomy. The events began and ended with prayers and included appeals to Donald Trump to intervene and to release Bashkan Gutsul from prison.

• The government has initiated a process of Local Public Administration reform. This will begin with a series of public consultations, lead to a draft concept and further discussions in Spring and to an eventual presentation to parliament in Fall. Currently the plan is light on details but seems to envision merging small villages into common administrative centers and replacing defunct mayors offices with new public service centers. The stated goal is to empower local authorities and give them enough size to be competitive for absorbing EU funds. No statements have yet indicated a reform to the Raion system or some new vision for Moldova’s extremely small and fragmented regional governments.

International Affairs

Here’s a roundup of the top stories of the week:

• President Sandu visited Poland this week and announced new defense cooperation agreements. Polish President Karol Nawrocki praised Moldova as a “model for many countries around the world, demonstrating how to escape Russia’s sphere of influence” and promised support for Moldova’s EU path as well as new bilateral military support. This visit is part of President Sandu’s diplomatic push in line with her 2026 priorities that included a recent speech in Strasbourg to PACE which Moldova Matters published in full:

• Romanian AUR leader and Make Europe Great Again (MEGA) champion took part in a huge AUR delegation to Washington DC. There, he attended a gala event hosted by the “Republicans for National Renewal” that included US Representatives Ana Paulina Luna (R-FL), Andy Ogles (R-TN) and Abraham Hamadeh (R-AZ). In a video from the event, Simion helps to carve up a Greenland shaped cake draped in the American flag. The event was also attended by Brian Brown, who seemed to accompany Simion on the whole trip and referred to him as “the next president of Romania.” Recall, Brown attended and spoke at the pre-election MEGA conference in Chisinau. Simion got an award at the gala and spoke of the need to unite the MAGA and MEGA movements. While carving the cake he can be heard to say “We need to get rid of Macron.” When challenged about his participation in the Greenland cake cutting he simply replied “This is the atmosphere at a reception in Washington DC these days.”

• George Simion will attend the “International Alliance of Sovereigntists” gathering in Washington DC. The event, alternately called the “Alliance of Sovereign Nations,” was announced by US Representative Ana Paulina Luna with few details except that it will be a counterpoint to the World Economic Forum whose attendees can quote “keep their creepy bug eating dystopian bs to themselves” - Ana Paulina Luna. The event will take place on March 4-5 and is sponsored / organized by Turning Point USA.

• President Sandu confirmed that she was not invited to join the “Board of Peace.” Answering a question about it, she stated that she “appreciates any genuine efforts aimed at achieving peace” but then pivoted to center questions of international law and territorial integrity - noting that Russia is currently violating Moldova’s territorial integrity and has been invited to the board. Most of Europe is refusing Mr. Trump’s board invitation for the time being and Canada’s invitation was withdrawn after Prime Minister Mark Carney offended Trump. You can see the current invitees and those that have accepted here.

Security - Another Drone Crashed in Moldova

This one was armed. This week a Geran-2 drone was found crashed in the garden of an uninhabited house in Crocmaz, Ştefan Vodă. The drone was armed with a BST-52 warhead including 50kg of explosives. Sappers removed the drone to a safe location and destroyed it in a controlled explosion.

President Sandu was asked by the press about whether or not simply condemning such actions and summoning the Russian ambassador was a sufficient response. She replied:

“Russia violates our airspace. The solutions are not simple, I agree with you that just expressing our position and condemning, in the case of Russia, is not enough, because Russia continues, both in relation to the Republic of Moldova and other independent states, to violate airspace,”

“It’s not simple, because all countries, after this war of Russia against Ukraine began, are trying to acquire such [air defense] equipment, and the demand is greater than the supply. Sometimes there are resources, but you have nowhere to buy. We are also trying to identify the resources, because, in our case, they are also a problem, and the manufacturers, so that we can strengthen the protection of the airspace as quickly as possible,”

Shor & Hybrid War Updates

Here’s a roundup of the top stories of the week:

• Shor’s A7A5 Cryptocurrency turns 1 year old - and keeps growing. British blockchain analysis firm Elliptic published a report with updates on the rubble backed stablecoin / sanctions evasion tool. A7A5 has now surpassed $100 billion dollars in transactions and a trading volume of $17.3 billion (see footnote2). They report that A7A5 is succeeding as a “safe harbor” for those wanting access to USDT3. The report stated that the total accounts with A7A5 have doubled since July 2025 in part because of 3 new features: 1) easy purchase or A7A5 from PSB bank cards in Russia, 2) Stablepay - a virtual debit card feature designed to help Russians make online purchases like Netflix or ChatGPT4, 3) Digital Promissory Notes - these are the crypto bearer bonds we previously wrote about. Elliptic reports that in spite of account growth and new features, A7A5 has plateaued as sanctions are succeeding at constraining its growth.

• Natalia Morari decided to test her travel ban to the EU and found… she is banned. The disgraced journalist attempted to cross from Moldova into Romania at the Leușeni-Albița checkpoint and was given an official decision showing that she is banned from the EU, European Economic Area and Swiss Confederation for 5 years. The ban cites “national security.” We first wrote about this ban, which also affected Chisinau Mayor Ion Ceban and Shor-network politician Vasile Tarlev, back in July. Morari tested the ban as an on-video stunt and claims that she wanted an official rejection so she can sue5.

• The FSB claims they arrested a Moldovan SIS agent in Moscow. Moldova’s Security and Intelligence Service (SIS) denied any connection to the arrested man. Journalists have reported that the arrested man is Serghei Mișin, former advisor to former-President Igor Dodon on interethnic relations. Later he was one of the founders of Shor’s Renaissance Party. IPN reports, citing sources, that this is a “settlement of scores between the Shor group and other allies of the Kremlin in the Republic of Moldova.” They claim that Serghei Mișin remained Igor Dodon’s man and that while the FSB is looking for culprits in their failure to influence the outcome of Moldova’s elections, Shor’s people are trying to feed them the heads of people associated with Dodon and the Socialists. President Sandu also refuted the FSB claims that he was a spy and took the opportunity to reiterate the government’s warning that citizens traveling to Russia risk arbitrary arrest and detention.

Crime & Corruption

Constantin Țuțu was sentenced to 8 years in prison. The former kick-boxer, turned Democratic Party MP, turned Plahotniuc’s “bodyguard” in exile, was convicted on illicit enrichment, false income tax returns and influence peddling. He was fined 450,000 lei and banned from holding office for 5 years. His lawyers are appealing and prosecutors, who had asked for 15 years in prison, are considering an appeal as well.

This is only one of the ongoing cases involving Mr. Țuțu, who previously avoided accountability in a murder case by running out the clock on the statute of limitations.

The details of this case are… frankly, stupid. While an MP Țuțu twice extorted €20,000 euros from the same family with the promise of getting their relative released from detention. Both times he did nothing and both times he gave the money back after being confronted by the family (he kept €2000 at one point which only served to elevate the later extortion charges).

Mr. Țuțu is not famed for his brilliance. Recall, after initially being detained with Plahotniuc in Greece, he was released because there was no international arrest warrant for him. He then constructed a one man criminal chase spree (while not being chased) that culminated in sneaking across multiple borders and attempting to bribe a Moldovan border guard… and immediately getting arrested. Other criminal cases are ongoing, including charges of attempting to illegally cross the border.

Economics & Infrastructure

Here’s a roundup of the top stories of the week:

• The first tests of the Vulcănești - Chișinau high voltage line were successful. Minister of Energy Dorin Junghietu stated that the line is now being energized but that construction of the power stations at either end of the line must still be completed. When operational this line will be able to carry 50% of Moldova’s peak energy consumption.

• The Ministry of Economy has announced a raft of new public services available on the EVO app. The digital app now integrates m-sign and m-cabinet as well as the ability to request a large number of digital services. Michelle Iliev, Secretary of State for Digitalization stated that this is only the beginning saying:

“Moldova will be among the first countries to implement the Digital Wallet and remote identification, to offer every entrepreneur and citizen a digital office anywhere in Europe.”