At a news conference on Wednesday, MP Gheorghe Mustata announced his intention to leave the parliamentary group of the Communist Party of Moldova (PCRM), relinquish his PCRM membership and join the “Patria-Moldova” Party. This March, the PCRM faction informed that the MP was excluded from its ranks, Info-Prim Neo reports. Gheorghe Mustata said that his exclusion from the faction and the party was illegal and that there was no relevant official decision. In a letter to the Head of Parliament Marian Lupu and to the PCRM president Vladimir Voronin, the parliamentarian explains that he decided to leave the party because he disagrees with its new programme and with the intolerant attitude towards the members that express their disagreement with the present policy and ideological changes. “It is impossible to express your opinion because you are immediately subjected to pressure and attacks,” Gheorghe Mustata said, stressing that he was expelled from PCRM for his ideas and convictions. According to the MP, the recently published new draft platform of the Communist Party contains many chapters and assertions that are incompatible with the Communist ideas and Marxist theories that the party’s leader claims to be committed to. PCRM turned into a Western-leaning liberal party that defends capitalist interests, Mustata said. At the same conference, Gheorghe Sima, vice president of the Party “Patria-Moldova”, said that he informed the U.S. Embassy in Chisinau, the OSCE Mission and the Special Representatives of the EU and the Council of Europe about the Ministry of Justice’s refusal to register the political organisation. Sima expressed his dissatisfaction with the fact that the foreign representative offices did not react and did not condemn the ruling party for its suppressive attitude towards the political opponents. Gheorghe Sima said he got the impression that the European representative offices and the U.S. Embassy have other interests than promoting democracy and European values in Moldova. Even if they issue official declarations, they do nothing practical to defend these values, the vice president of “Patria-Moldova” said. At the seventh congress of the party this September, it was decided to consolidate the left-wing parties in order to take part in the 2009 parliamentary elections, to modify the statute and change the party’s name. Andrei Tarna was elected as president. Gheorghe Musteata is expert in science of commodities. He entered the Parliament ranking the 62nd in the PCRM’s list, while first secretary of the PCRM District Committee in Soldanesti.