The Republic of Moldova didn’t fully fulfill the eight conditions agreed in the meeting of the EU-Moldova Association Council for obtaining the second tranche of the macro-financial assistance, MP Igor Munteanu, vice president of the Party “Dignity and Truth Platform”, stated, being quoted by IPN.
“Recently, some of the officials of the current government said that they fulfilled the commitments and expect the second tranche to be paid immediately, exaggerating, as usual, in terms of style, precision and communication,” said Igor Munteanu, making reference to one of these conditions.
According to him, two of the conditions - joining of the OECD Anticorruption Network for Eastern Europe and Central Asia and the moratorium on the “Citizenship by Investment” program have been partially met. As regards the first condition, the procedures were finalized, but the accession is not yet over. As to the second condition, the moratorium was extended until September 1, 2020, but the law hasn’t been abrogated.
Igor Munteanu noted that four of the eight conditions haven’t been satisfied. One of them is to create a joint team for the investigation of the bank fraud. “Even if financial resources have been allocated, the joint investigation team with Latvian experts and the EU agency Eurojust hasn’t been yet set up.” The MP said the independent foreign audits at the Audiovisual Council and the Competition Council also weren’t conducted, as Commissioner for European Neighborhood Policy and Enlargement Negotiations Olivér Várhelyi requested, and the leaders of the two agencies vehemently opposed such an assessment.
As to the justice sector reform strategy, Igor Munteanu said this condition wasn’t fulfilled. “The process of working out this strategy is at an incipient stage and implies the effective and credible involvement of experts of the CoE, EU (DG Just), civil society and political parties,” he added. As regards the reform of the Superior Council of Magistracy, he said that, as in the case of the justice sector reform strategy, the reformation process implies the effective involvement and progress ascertained by experts of the CoE, EU (DG Just), with the participation of civil society and political parties.
As to the adoption of the law on noncommercial organizations, the MP noted that the law was adopted in the second reading on June 12, but it wasn’t given a final reading. This condition will be fulfilled when the law is passed, promulgated and published.
According to him, the adoption of the law on penalties for offenses related to money laundering is the only condition that was fully met. “The law was adopted in the final reading on May 21, 2020,” said the politician.
He also said that the pandemic crisis made the current government’s task to fulfill the commitments much more difficult. “It would be injudicious not to admit this. However, for the sake of truth, we should not accept any failure, fault or delay to be easily shifted onto the effects of this scourge called COVID-19. This would be more than a mistake. It would be a strategic error in relation to the EU,” concluded Igor Munteanu.
