"Europe is at war again. Two wars, in fact"

“One destroys cities. The other erodes trust.” Maia Sandu addresses the Council of Europe

On January 27, President Maia Sandu delivered an address in Strasbourg to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE). The speech came as Moldova holds the rotating presidency of the Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers - only the second time the country has done so, after 2003. It was also only the second time a Moldovan head of state has addressed the Assembly, and the first such address since 2001.

While often conflated with the European Union, the Council of Europe is a separate and older institution. Founded in 1949, its core mission has been to prevent the return of authoritarianism to Europe by upholding human rights, democracy, and the rule of law. Its most powerful body, the European Court of Human Rights, issues binding judgments for all 46 member states - including countries outside the EU such as Moldova, Ukraine, Türkiye, and the United Kingdom. Addressing PACE, then, means speaking not just to governments, but to the institutional guardians of Europe’s democratic norms.

President Sandu used that platform to argue that Europe is already facing two wars: one kinetic, and one hybrid. She urged the Assembly to “act at the speed of the threat,” warning that Europe’s response remains dangerously mismatched to the challenge:

“You do not respond to a patient in cardiac arrest by announcing a long-term public health strategy.”

I’ve decided to publish the speech in full for several reasons. The fact of a Moldovan president addressing PACE alone would make this moment notable. The fact that President Sandu used the address to issue a blunt warning of the threat, and critique of past action, makes it historic.

Moldova’s success in fending off sustained Russian hybrid attacks has given the country a credibility - and a degree of moral authority - that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago.

President Maia Sandu’s speech is published below in full. You can find it published on the website of the Presidency in English. If you prefer, you can also watch it on youtube here:

President of the Assembly, Madam Petra Bayr, congratulations on your election,
Secretary General, Alain Berset,
Honourable Members of Parliaments,
Distinguished guests,

Today, I want to speak about the two wars Europe is facing, how our democracies are being attacked, how those attacks are amplified by technology, and what we should do to protect our peace, our democratic choices, and our freedom.

As Moldova holds the rotating Presidency of the Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers, allow me to remind us that the Council of Europe was born from the failure of European democracies to protect themselves in time. From the realisation that peace without democratic resilience is temporary.

The Statute of the Council of Europe is explicit.

Its purpose is to achieve greater unity.
To safeguard human rights.
To uphold democracy and the rule of law.

Not as ideals alone.
But as systems that must withstand pressure, manipulation, and abuse.

The Council of Europe was never meant to be a comfort zone.
It was meant to be a line of defence.

And today, Europe is at war again. Two wars, in fact.

The first is visible, brutal, and devastating.

Russia is waging a conventional full-scale military invasion of Ukraine. Cities are destroyed. Civilians are killed. Energy infrastructure is deliberately targeted. This winter, millions of Ukrainians are living in darkness and cold — not because of the weather, but because the Kremlin has made freezing civilians a weapon of war.

To break the will of a nation by making life itself unlivable.

For most of us, this kind of suffering is impossible to imagine. But for Ukrainians, it is daily life. And it demands not only our solidarity — but our responsibility.

For Moldova, this war is not distant.

In Moldova we know that we owe our peace to Ukraine’s resistance.

We know that if Ukraine falls, Russia will not stop at Moldova.

Ukraine’s fight is therefore about the security of Moldova, of the region, and of Europe as a whole.

And this is also why there can be no lasting peace without accountability for Russia’s aggression. Without justice, war does not end — it only pauses and prepares to return.

Here, the Council of Europe has a vital role to play — not as a neutral observer, but as a political guardian of democratic values and international law. The accountability mechanisms developed within this Organisation, including the register of damage and work to ensure justice for victims, are essential to restoring trust in the rules that protect us all.

But while our attention is rightly focused on this war, a second war is unfolding.
This is the war against our democracies

It is less visible.
But it is no less dangerous.

This war is being fought inside our societies.

It is a hybrid war.
An information war.
A war to divide people and control our hearts and minds.

This war is accelerated by technologies we do not fully see and understand. By algorithms that increasingly determine what people read, watch, and believe, while their logic remains largely opaque.

These two wars are not separate. They reinforce one another.

Russia’s military aggression and its hybrid operations pursue the same objective: to undermine, control, and divide Europe.

One destroys cities.
The other erodes trust.

One uses missiles.
The other uses money, narratives, and manipulation.

This is how democracies are attacked — from within.

At the core of this second war are two things.

Dark money.
And dark politics.

Dark money fuels dark politics.

Illicit financial flows make manipulation scalable and persistent. They pay for influence operations, political capture, and disinformation designed to divide societies and turn people against themselves — against their own state, democracy, and freedom.

Moldova has been — and still is — on the frontline of this second war.

For two consecutive years, our country has faced massive electoral interference. It was multi-domain.

An energy crisis designed to put economic pressure on vulnerable citizens.
Political corruption targeting parties and candidates.
Information warfare across online platforms.
Cyber operations aimed at institutions and voters.

All with one objective: to seize Parliament, install a Kremlin-controlled government, crush our democracy, drag Moldova into Russia’s sphere of influence, and use it against Ukraine and against Europe.

And if that failed, to delegitimise elections, provoke unrest, and weaken trust in our institutions.

Social networks became central battlegrounds in this war. What we saw in Moldova was not a spontaneous expression. It was organised, funded, and scaled by AI.

One single coordinated network of just over 100 fake accounts on TikTok, operating for less than three months, generated around 50 million views, over 100,000 comments, and more than 1.5 million interactions — in a country of 2.4 million people.

The goal was to create a false impression of overwhelming anger and social collapse — to exhaust citizens, amplify fear, and discourage democratic participation. This was not an isolated case.

We also documented the activity of an influence network, already identified by European partners, which produced more than one thousand coordinated publications about our country in just a few months.

These messages accumulated tens of millions of views and were deliberately laundered through seemingly credible voices before being amplified by inauthentic accounts.

This targeted Moldova’s image abroad.

When traditional propaganda channels were restricted, hostile actors adapted again.

Content linked to Kremlin-affiliated broadcast media was delivered directly into people’s homes through mobile applications, bypassing audiovisual regulation entirely.

When exposed, these outlets did not disappear.
They changed domains and jurisdiction.
They rebranded and resumed operations within days.

This adaptability tells us something essential.

We are facing professional, well-funded, long-term operations — built on the systematic identification of vulnerabilities, enabled by transnational infrastructure, and sustained by the exploitation of legal loopholes.

Moldova is not the only country facing these challenges.
We see similar pressures across Europe.

I am proud to say that Moldova resisted this two-year assault through a whole-of-society effort. Our citizens proved their commitment to peace, to Europe, and to democracy.

But I regret to see Georgia, where — despite the courage of the Georgian people, who continue to stand up for democratic values, European aspirations, and the right to decide their own future — Russia pulled Georgia back into its orbit by weaponising the fear of war, signalling that the wrong electoral choice would come at the cost of peace.

Now Armenia is becoming a target of the same strategy — aimed at weakening sovereignty, influencing democratic choices, and exploiting internal vulnerabilities.

We stand with Armenia and its people as they work to resist these pressures and defend their democratic future.

Among all the ways this hybrid war is waged, the most dangerous for the future of our democracies is information manipulation amplified by technology, opaque algorithms, and artificial intelligence.

If left unchecked, those who control technology will increasingly control how people think.

I am particularly concerned about the impact of this cognitive war on the younger generation.

If we want democracies that can resist manipulation, we must protect the freedom of young minds.

This is not only a question of technology or regulation.
It is a question of democratic resilience.

Trust, critical thinking, and mental wellbeing are essential conditions for free societies.

The Council of Europe has already given us a clear starting point: children’s rights apply fully online, and states have a responsibility to protect their best interests in the digital environment.

Moldova’s experience shows why this matters: disinformation works by exhausting societies — by making people fearful, divided, and distrustful. And it is especially effective where young people are left unprotected in digital spaces designed to exploit attention and emotion.

This brings me to what I think we should do.

Long-term efforts alone will not meet the urgency of this threat.

You do not respond to a patient in cardiac arrest by announcing a long-term public health strategy.

You act immediately.
You stabilise the patient.
You stop the bleeding.
And then you invest in prevention and resilience.

Today, our democracies are under acute attack.

Treating this only as a long-term challenge — while elections are actively manipulated and institutions destabilised — leaves democracies exposed at the very moment they need protection.

We must act at the speed of the threat.
And we must protect our democracies without betraying democratic principles.

Here, the Council of Europe has a unique role to play.

We need a clear and comprehensive legal instrument on foreign information manipulation and interference — one that addresses election interference, media concentration and capture, organised crime, cybercrime, corruption, and the malign use of artificial intelligence and other technologies.

This should allow us to act before damage is done — not after.

After two years of resisting Russian interference, here is what has worked for us.

Coordinated disinformation campaigns must be exposed and disrupted before they shape voters’ perceptions and distort democratic debate.
For this, journalists and civil society must be protected.

Foreign interference and proxy actors must be exposed before trust in elections is undermined.

Illegal party financing must be tracked before those who benefit from it gain power through the ballot box.

And I cannot emphasise elections enough.

In democracies, they are the most vulnerable entry point for foreign manipulation — and the most decisive one. This is where trust can be broken fastest, where disinformation has the greatest impact, and where illicit money can translate directly into power.

That is why monitoring must begin months before voting day and extend fully into the online space.

Digital interference must be detected in real time, not reconstructed afterwards.

And illegal money must be identified and stopped before it distorts the will of voters.

Cutting off the financial lifelines of interference, including through cryptocurrency, is essential to stopping manipulation at scale.

The work of the Financial Action Task Force and MONEYVAL has been essential in strengthening anti–money laundering frameworks across Europe. Moldova is also largely compliant with MONEYVAL standards. Yet our experience shows that even strong AML systems are not enough.

We lacked the legal and operational tools to act fast against illicit financial flows specifically designed to interfere with elections.

Money fuels interference. Technology amplifies it. Therefore we must govern the digital space responsibly.

The internet and social platforms have strengthened freedom and connection. They are among humanity’s great innovations. But no invention exists without rules. Electricity requires safety standards. Cars require traffic rules — especially near schools. The digital space is no different.

Children’s wellbeing must be protected.

Freedom of expression must be protected from fake accounts posing as free voices.

Artificial intelligence must be governed with care.

Taken together, these are acts of democratic self-defence. And they define whether democracy remains a living system — or becomes an open target.

So we must move faster than the threat and take the initiative.

The Council of Europe was created for moments like this — not when democracy is comfortable, but when it is contested.

Moldova’s presidency of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe will act with this responsibility in mind.

Thank you.

Photo Source: Moldovan Presidency