International organizations ask for European intervention to stop intimidation of Moldovan civil society

A number of international organizations demand that the European institutions intervene to stop the policy of systematically intimidating the civil society in Moldova pursued by the Moldovan authorities, Info-Prim Neo reports, quoting a communiqué from the Pro Democracy Association (APD). The organizations claim that the members of the Civic Coalition for Free and Fair Elections - Coalition 2009, which monitored the electoral process and said the April 5 parliamentary elections were unfair and partly free, are being harassed. According to the APD, after a series of attacks on the part of the Ministry of Justice, which, saying that the names were much the same, confused the Civic Coalition for Free and Fair Elections with the Civic Coalition - Elections 2009, which filed an application, asking to be allowed to hold protests in the Great National Assembly Square on April 7, the Moldovan authorities started to simultaneously inspect the organizations that form part of the Council of this network (the League for the Defense of Human Rights Moldova /LADOM/, the Public Policy Institute /IPP/, the Electronic Press Association /APEL/, the Association for Participative Democracy /ADEPT/, the Institute for Development and Social Initiative /IDIS/ “Viitorul”, the Independent Journalism Center /CIJ/, the Association for the Promotion of Legal Clinics in Moldova). “Not disputing the Moldovan authorities’ right to carry out such inspections within the law, we consider that the simultaneous inspection of the seven organizations is an attempt to suppress the independent and critical attitude of the watchdogs and intimidate the whole Moldovan civil society,” the communiqué says. In this connection, the Pro Democracy Association, GOLOS (Russia), GONG (Croatia), European House (Hungary) and the Society for Democratic Culture (Albania) call on the European authorities to intervene and stop the intimidation of the Moldovan NGOs and protect them from the abuses by the Government of Moldova. The appeal was addressed to the European Parliament, the Council of Ministers of the European Union and the Council of Europe. The Policy Association for an Open Society (PASOS) also condemned the Moldovan authorities for their acts and asked the EU to condemn the autocratic and unilateral control of the politic and economic institutions in Moldova. “The authorities obstruct the activity of the civil society and independent mass media at a time when the independent voices are so needed to identify and investigate the violations of human rights committed by the police after the April 5 elections,” the members of the network say in a statement.