The legal, psychological and rehabilitation center for victims of torture in Comrat provided assistance to Moldovan citizens detained at the border with Bulgaria, in May 2019, due to being suspected of committing crimes in Turkey. Two months after the detention, four people were able to return to Moldova, while the other four returned after almost 80 days.
During an IPN press conference, Evghenia Cîssa, a psychologist at the center of Comrat, said that the Moldovans were detained in inhuman conditions, without being provided reasons for their detention, without receiving the services of a translator and without access to personal hygiene objects. For five days, the eight Moldovans, both women and men, were held in the same space and slept on the concrete floor of the cell. According to the Bulgarian authorities, the Embassy of the Republic of Moldova did not wish to provide support to these persons.
The center's lawyer, Andrei Aladov, explained that the Moldovans were returning home from Turkey by bus, which was also used by the person suspected of committing a robbery attack in Turkey. At the Bulgarian border, several people were arrested on the bus, including the eight Moldovans. The specialists continue to provide psychological, as well as legal assistance, as some of them have been barred from entering the territory of Bulgaria and Turkey.
The Comrat Center is one of the three centers opened within the project "Together we say NO to torture in Moldova: civil society against torture", funded by the European Union. The other two centers are in Chișinău and Tiraspol. The project to condemn the phenomenon of torture and to rehabilitate the victims is implemented by the Comrat Institute for Democracy, in partnership with the Media Center of Tiraspol and the National Institute for Women in Chișinău.
