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Representatives of the Liberal Party (PL), Liberal Democratic Party of Moldova (PLDM) and “Moldova Noastra” (Our Moldova) Alliance (AMN) told a press conference on Tuesday that by inviting the three parties to participate in vote recount, the Party of Communists (PCRM) is trying to legalise the election results and deprive the opposition parties of possibility to contest the recorded frauds in law courts. “At the same time, the PCRM is trying through a new mystification to get new seats in the Parliament, so that to be able to elect a chief of state,” representatives of opposition stated. The three parties fear that the PCRM initiative on vote recount and the further decisions by the Constitutional Court and CEC to organise the vote recount on April 15 are unable to elucidate the election fraud. They stressed that the “fraudulent issuance of basic and supplementary voter rolls, including the groundless rise of the number of voters by approximately 400,000 people, the inclusion of some people who do not reside the indicated address, the repeated voting, the signatures in line with the names of dead people and those who are abroad etc.,” are the major problem. PL, PLDM and AMN leaders noted that they will keep checking the voter rolls, the way they were issued and the voting procedure and the findings of this ample investigation will be submitted to the Constitutional Court, public opinion and international organisations. (Source: Interlic)

The Court of Appeal made a decision in this respect on Tuesday. Therefore, the court awarded victory to the Party of Communists of the Republic of Moldova (PCRM), which applied for the suppression of phrase “with the possibility to make copies” from the April 8, 2009 Central Electoral Commission (CEC) decision concerning the access to electoral lists. The PCRM representative to the CEC, Serghei Sîrbu, told journalists that by introducing this phrase, the CEC has gone beyond its competences, as the Election Code does not stipulate such a procedure. Some electoral contestants use these lists for illegal purposes that means to intimidate or pressure those who participated or not in voting, and that’s why we want this phrase to be deleted. On the other hand, the CEC describes the PCRM accusations as groundless, as the legislation allows the access to personal data if they were released previously. “The Election Code says that the voter rolls shall be displayed at electoral offices 20 days before the elections. As regards the identity data of people, including those from identity cards, they may be made public,” CEC representative Ruslan Nastas noted. Even more, Nastas stressed that “was not violated any right of the PCRM, it relies on breached rights of other people.” (Source: Omega)

The Central Electoral Commission (CEC) published on Tuesday the names of the 21 members of the newly-elected Parliament who hold or applied for a foreign citizenship. According to the CEC, these members shall certify before April 21 that they renounced or applied for renunciation of a foreign citizenship. The PCRM has a parliamentarian who holds the Bulgarian citizenship; the PL — nine with Romanian citizenship, including three applicants; the PLDM — 5, including two applicants; the AMN — 6, including one who holds the Russian and Romanian citizenships, another two hold the Romanian citizenship, and another three applied for the Romanian citizenship. (Source: Deca-press)

The OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, Miklos Haraszti, urged the Moldovan authorities on Tuesday, April 14 to secure free access for international media and allow unhindered reporting in the country, according to a communication by the OSCE. He also called on journalists to observe the professional rules of detachment when covering events such as demonstrations that followed last week’s parliamentary elections. “Whatever the circumstances, restrictions on media and freedom reporting infringe on several OSCE principles in the media sphere,” Haraszti wrote in a letter sent to Moldovan Foreign Minister and Deputy Premier Andrei Stratan. In the letter, Haraszti listed the numerous complaints from foreign and Moldovan journalists about mishandling by border services and law enforcement bodies, as well as complaints involving ill-treatment and arrest of journalists, restricted Internet access. (Source: Info-Prim)

The European Union is ready to deploy a mission to Moldova to monitor the situation in Chisinau, European Commission representative Cristiana Homan said in Brussels on Tuesday. “We can deploy a mission to the capital of Moldova to find out all factors capable to assist resolution of the problem,” Homan said in a press statement. As well, on behalf of the European Commission Cristiana Homan welcomed the decision of the Moldovan authorities to recount the votes in the parliamentary elections, adding that any violence and violation of the freedom of assembly are inadmissible. (Source: Omega)

Some TV stations especially Eu TV and N4 have promoted masked electoral messages before the elections, airing programmes which envisaged electoral subjects. Thus, the two stations violated Article 47 of the Election Code, which prohibits the electoral propaganda on the eve of elections and on the Election Day. This statement was delivered by Vasile State, coordinator of a project on monitoring of the conduct of Chisinau-based TV stations in the electoral period. This project is implemented by the Electronic Press Association (APEL), which held a press conference on Tuesday, April 14. According to monitors, five TV channels (Eu TV, N4, NIT, Pro TV and TV7) rebroadcasted on April 4, 2009 some news programmes with participation of electoral contestants which they aired on the eve, and two of them (Eu TV and N4) sent messages during their programmes to advantage or disadvantage some candidates. The monitored TV channels practiced two types of journalism during the electoral campaign: one close to democracy and another one close to attachment. Pro TV, TV 7 and TVC 21 practiced the first type of journalism, while Eu TV, Moldova 1, NIT and N4 the second one, according to an APEL press release. These conclusions come from the final monitoring report on presence of political players in TV programmes, worked out by the Electronic Press Association during February 4 — April 5, 2009. (Source: Info-Prim)

The leader of the “Actiunea Europeana” (European Action) Movement (MAE), Anatol Petrenco, has addressed two letters to the United States Ambassador to Moldova, Mr. Asif J. Chaudhry, and Mr. Cesare de Montis, Head of the European Commission Delegation in Chisinau, seeking their support “to release the young people who are held and ill-treated at police stations”. This way, the MAE chairman wants to notify organisations of the international community “in connection with grave violations of human rights in Moldova recorded in the latest period.” “We consider that this proves the repressive and dictatorial way the Chisinau communist regime treats own citizens,” reads Petrenco’s letters. (Source: MAE press release)

A UN commission has investigated the treatment of individuals who had been arrested in Chisinau, retaining that the majority were young people without an offending history and that the Moldovan authorities had committed “extreme acts of violence” against them. According to a related report, the people were hit with clubs, with both fist and feet. The UN experts have also identified cases of women who had been beaten with bestiality. Moreover, the young people were not allowed to benefit from legal counselling and were made sign depositions or other papers they had not been permitted to read first. (Source: Deca-press)

The organisation ARTICLE 19 condemns the climate of fear created by the Moldovan government, including the intimidation and censorship of dissenting voices and the media. The organisation calls on the authorities to release all those imprisoned for the peaceful expression of their views, and urges them to establish the whereabouts of those that have allegedly disappeared, according to a statement by ARTICLE 19. The organisation also demands that those peacefully expressing their views are protected from arbitrary detention and police brutality. ARTICLE 19 considers that the current climate of fear, through intimidation, attacks and possible “disappearances” of peaceful demonstrators and journalists, and censorship of the media, through assaults on journalists, entry bans and blocking of websites violate fundamental human rights and freedom of expression. The international organisation Reporters Without Borders has also condemned the actions of Moldovan authorities against journalists and called upon the government to act with calm and refraining. It invited the OSCE to adopt a firm position on this situation. (Source: Interlic)