Despite change of power Moldavian Secret Services hold true to Voronin's principles

Special services of the Republic of Moldova continue Russians hunting.

Dina Konopleva, consultant editor of the foreign Department of Regional Information Agency “Dniester”, comments on the situation when she was kept by Moldavian secret services officers at the border between Moldova and Pridnestrovie. The incident took place on December, 5th 2009:

- On December, 5th, my father and I needed to go to Kishinev, as we had some stuff to do there. My father is a businessmen in Pridnestrovie, and he is citizen of Russian Federation and Pridnestrovie. On our way back, at about 1 p.m. moldavian special services officers stopped our car right before the Peacekeeping quarters. As everybody knows, Moldova has its own unofficial customs terminal there. I was surprised as that day there were too many policemen there – about 7 people. Without presenting themselves and without showing their documents Moldavian policemen gave us an order that we must run our car off the road, they took our documents – international passports of Russian federation – and disappeared in their iron box.

Ten minutes passed and we understood that something wrong was going on. The policemen continued sitting in the box, eyeing us with curiosity from grimy windows. We already decided to crash the border and to ask Russian peacekeepers for help, because it looked like a provocation - nobody never checks any passports or other documents at that Moldavian unofficial border. But then 4 people appeared before us, two of them wearing moldavian police uniform, the other one, who was a little bit older and the last guy dressed in black unofficial clothes. They asked us to drive to their iron box and said that we should step out of the vehicle.

They wanted to know where we were going from and where we were going to. After that, without showing their documents and presenting themselves, but in a very polite way, they announced that they were going to examine our car. We stepped out smiling and watched them seeking through the car. They asked us to take all our personal things and to open our bags. They even screw extra wheel, cheked the engine number and looked through the first-aid kit. They were especially agitated when they found some medicine of the white granules form. They passed this packet to each other, sniffing at it and tried to read the instruction in Russian, but they scrupled to open it.

Then, the most interesting things happened – they decided to check our documents. Firstly, I gave them my international passport of Russian Federation. Having taken it, the officer who was wearing citizens’ clothes smiled and asked where I am resident. He must have been very upset when I gave him my Russian domestic passport with official residential registration in the city of Bryansk, Russian Federation. All the questions melt away.

As for my father, he was in a problematic situation. As the officer of secret service declared (he must have been from secret service as he was wearing citizens’ clothes), my father was committing a very serious crime. The crime is that my father – citizen of Russia – has been living illegally at the “territory of Moldova” in Tiraspol for a long time. So the officer said that they had a right to arrest my father, take him to Chisinau and deport to Russia. But they said that it was the first warning and my father had to get a Moldavian document – residence permit, which is, actually, “non-citizen passport”.

A for me, he said that I have a right to stay at the territory of Moldova for 90 days in 6 months. Otherwise I will become “illegal immigrant”. As far as I know, Moldovan citizens can stay in Russian Federation the whole year round – they can come to any border, leave the country and in five minutes eneter Russia again and stay for the next 90 days. As I’ve found out, Moldova has strict rules – they are little by little copying the immigration legislation of the European countries, they are hammering out corresponding laws according to which I become illegal immigrant after staying for more than 90 days half a year, despite the fact that I was born in Tiraspol and lived there for 19 years and I have Pridnestrovian citizenship.

Frankly speaking, I used to go to Moldova very seldom – once in several years. This can be explained by the fact that communists, who brought many troubles to Pridnestrovie, were in power in Moldova for a long time. One can just remember economical and telephone blockades, abolishing trains. When young liberals came to power in Moldova, some of Pridnestrovie’s people hoped that the relations would become warmer. Mikhai Ghimpu, Vlad Filat and members of the Moldovan Parliament often said that they are ready to sacrifice their principles, to conduct sober policies in their dialogue with Pridnestrovian authorities. The fact that Moldovan authorities decided to fire out secret services’ and Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ directors because of the events of April, 7th , gave hope. I was waiting for the thaw to begin. Of course, we couldn’t expect such a behaviour from Moldovan secret services at the border which they do not recognize themselve. However, nothing changes. It seems that Moldavian Secret Services and Ministry of foreign Affairs continue following the same Voronin’s traditions – they persecute Russian citizens, frisk people and make them “illegal immigrants” without any reason. The same threats and hints of what they think about us. It turns out that my family, all of my relatives and friends who have lived in Tiraspol for the whole of their life do not have any rights when going to Bessarabia, despite Russian and Ukrainian international passports. Anybody can be arrested and deported.

I was very curious to learn about the core of the procedure of getting this notorious “resident permit”. Well, this is a real slur – all possible analyses, bureaucratic delays, the necessity to go to Moldova again and again, and, what is the most important – absolute absence of political and civil rights. To bang head against a brick wall of Moldavian bureaucracy to get this fool "Mickey Mouse" document and “thanks to it” have an opportunity to go to Chisinau once a year and to fly from Moldavian airport to Moscow – I don’t think it is worth it. Thanks God, Odessa is near to Tiraspol and Russian citizens do not need international passports in the Ukraine, and Ukrainians, by the way, are very often loyal to Pridnestrovian passport either. It is really strange, that any representative of power in Chisinau, even if he is very democratic, can wait for Pridnestrovians’ sympathy after they made Pridnestrovians “non-citizens”.

Well, these people on the road didn’t act themselves, they were executing their law and commands of their front office. I think that if Mikhai Ghimpu and Vlad Filat, Marian Lupu and Serafim Urekyan constitute themselves as Europeans, they should be ashamed because at the territory of the country which they present as one united Moldova such things happen, as contrasted with Europe where one can travel from country to country without humiliating unwarranted searches.

Of course, it is not difficult for me to spend 3 months in Tiraspol and then three months in Bryansk to avoid arrests and deports. I have a place to live in Bryansk, I have many things to do there. But, as it turns out, according to Moldovan Legislation, half of Pridnestrovie’s citizens live on their land illegally. I would find it interesting to see how Moldavian authorities will deport 240 000 people and what Russia, Ukraine and Europe will say about it. Of course, today Russian soldiers prevent them from doing that, and Pridnestrovians can stand up for themselves. But one can imagine what would have happened if there were neither peacekeepers, nor Pridnestrovian army. Especially remembering the passing remark made by Moldavian secret service officer that they are very “sorry” that they do not control Pridnestrovian part of the border with the Ukraine.

This problem did not appear today, it is very old. But Moldavian authorities will never bring something to the table if secret services behave like that. As the result, Pridnestrovian citizens will stop going to Bessarabia. It is really funny to think that this situation has anything to do with European values and democracy about which they often speak in Chisinau for the last couple of months. It turns out that they just throw dust in people’s eyes.