A number of nongovernmental organizations consider the “April 7” case is a failed one. In a public call made to the Moldovan authorities and law enforcement agencies, these are recommended to take action to shed light in this case and to stop torturing persons in state custody.

Contacted by IPN for a comment, Amnesty International Moldova executive director Veaceslav Tofan said that it is not clear for him why steps to eliminate torture haven’t been taken. He presumes that there is no political will to deal with the “April 7” case. A number of persons who were suspected of having used torture kept the posts and were even promoted.

Veaceslav Tofan said the call to take action to eliminate torture was made to all the governments that managed the country since April 7, 2009. Regrettably, none of them had the courage to cast light and Moldova remains with an unsolved mass torture problem.

“I once said that the risk of the “April 7” case in Moldova having the same fate as Romania’s case of December 1989 is very big as nobody seriously deals with these cases here and there,” stated Veaceslav Tofan.

He noted that Moldova annually records approximately 600 complaints about the use of torture. Last year, ten years after the April 2009 events, Amnesty International Moldova transmitted a number of recommendations for diminishing or even eliminating the phenomenon of torture to the authorities, but these weren’t taken into account. “Such cases as that of Braguța or Sergey Cosovan clearly show that a problem remained unsolved and the people are tortured and ill-treated and some of them even die,” stated the activist.

The signatory organizations ask to publish information about the state functionaries who are suspected of having used torture during the events of April 2009 and to adopt and implement all the legislative, instructive and organizational measures aimed at fully eradicating torture, inhuman and degrading treatment and to create conditions for the effective rehabilitation of the victims of torture.

The call was signed by Amnesty International Moldova, Rehabilitation Center for Torture Victims “Memoria”, Promo LEX Association, Journalistic Investigations Center, Human Rights Embassy, Moldovan Institute for Human Rights, Association of Independent Press, Transparency International Moldova and Human Rights Information Center.