
Plahotniuc’s revenge
The authors of the 34-page report, made in the Rumanian language, of the Investigation Committee of the Moldovan Parliament are six MPs. Half of them come from the Democratic Party controlled by Plahotniuc. As one of the DGP interlocutors argues, the informal curator of the work on the document was his mate and vice-head of the Democrats Andrian Candu. – Even though he was not a member of the Investigation Committee, he was the one to edit its final version, and this is evidenced by the information contained in the so-called metadata word file in which the report had been saved before it was converted to PDF – DGP’s informer says – It is clear from it that the document was edited or even entirely written by Candu and his people – he adds. Plahotniuc, who began his career in the pimp business and specialised over time in gathering erotic films discrediting his political and business opponents, ruled the country indivisibly until mid-June this year. A week ago – immediately after a conversation with the US Ambassador – he evacuated himself by car from Chisinau, through the separatist Transnistria, to the Ukrainian Odessa, and from there by plane to Istanbul. For several years, he enjoyed the support of the West because he had caused the signing of an association agreement with the European Union and in the declarations at least he guaranteed geopolitical orientation towards the West and the deterring of Russia’s influence along eastern border of the EU-NATO – Moldova. He lost that support when it turned out that the agreement was only an alibi which allowed him to rob, without moderation, the state in which a rebellion was still smoldering, following the model of Viktor Yankovych. After Kozlovska was entered into the SIS by Poland last summer, Plahotniuc – referring directly to the statement that came from the Ministercoordinating the Special Services Mariusz Kamiński – ordered the appointment of an investigation committee to demonstrate the diversionary activities of ODF. The target of the hunting was not only Kozlovska, but above all the pro-Western opposition seeking to seize the power. – An attempt was to delegalise groups that could threaten him, Natalia Morari, a Moldovan journalist and activist collaborating with Maia Sandu and Kozlovska, was saying in a conversation with DGP. In her view, the objective of Plahotniuc was total monopolisation of the state. The building of a system of power relying on family and friends known as cumetrie. In Romanian, this term has double meaning. It means loyal, quasi-family links and arrangements but also plain cronyism. The head of the Moldovan Investigation Committee, which began its work on 5 October 2018 and was inspired by Poland’s measures towards ODF, was a trusted politician of the Democratic Party and a trusted friend of Plahotniuc himself, the lawyer Igor Vremea. His direct curator was the aforementioned Candu. The main sources of knowledge of the Committee were three local special services which the oligarch controlled – Information and Security Service (SIS – equivalent of the Polish ABW), the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Anti-money Laundering and Prevention service (SPCSB – equivalent of the Polish tax intelligence). We read in the document that the persons who testified in the matter of ODF and the opposition included Vasile Botnari, representing the SIS, head of the SPCSB – Vasile Şarco and secretary of state at the Ministry of Internal Affairs – Dorin Purice. The report concludes that the foundation was financed by the Russian Ministry of Defence, and the funds were supposedly to flow through tax havens. No evidence is presented though. The main donor of the foundation was supposedly to be Petro Kozłowski, Ludmyla’s brother (which is no secret, which the ODF did not conceal and which appeared, inter alia, in the so-called Rey Report, the Polish publication describing the foundation’s links) and his business partners Arkadiy Agarkov of the Stali company operating in Saint Petersburg and Andrey Brovchenko from the same city. You can also read that Ludmyla’s sister, Olena Miroshnikov, is a co-owner of a network of companies in Sevastopol (this information was also contained in the Rey document). ODF was supposedly provided with money from these people, and Silk Road supposedly cooperated with a number of companies related to Petro Kozlovsky and his businesses (DGP has a full list of these entities, and about some of them which did not appear in the so-called Rey Report – the Moldovan side could find out from the Polish side by which it might have infringed treasury secrecy in the ongoing proceedings against Silk Road).