A man, 30, was arrested after he tried to cross the border with a fake biometric Moldovan passport, which he allegedly bought for 1,500 euros, in the first such case this year, the Border Police announced in a press release.

The passport that the man produced at the Criva crossing point arose suspicions and after a more thorough check it was found that the document belonged to a different person and the bio-data page had been apparently forged.

The suspect admitted he knew about the fake. He told the Border Police he bought the document to travel to Germany, where he had been banned from in 2012. The document was seized and proceedings have been initiated to identify all the persons involved.

ID forgery offenses are punishable by fines of up to 6,000 lei, or up to 200 hours of community service, or prison terms of up to 2 years.