Prosecutor-General Valeriu Balaban accused of violating legitimate rights of citizens

The deputy chairman of the organisation for the protection of human rights Adjuta–Cives, Alexandru Procop, launched severe accusations against Prosecutor-General Valeriu Balaban at a news conference on March 7, charging him with doing what the authorities like by violating the legitimate rights of citizens and setting accounts with inconvenient persons. According to Procop, persons who seek the help of the Moldovan Prosecutor-General’s Office are treated with indifference, arrogance, and they are even told sometimes to give bribes in exchange for a necessary decision. Also, citizens receive formal, unmotivated answers to their appeals that ignore the arguments from their complaints. Procop noted that the prosecutor’s office has lost the major quality – impartiality in fulfilling the professional duty, which allows the authorities to rally functionaries of the prosecutor’s office in political settings. Wanting to do what authorities want, especially when they could raise money, certain prosecutors violate the law openly, are accomplices of judges, drafting legal acts for them, file cases at order, establish informal relations with persons against whom they conduct investigations or who hold investigations, commit groundless holdings, obtain the illegal arrest of inconvenient citizens from court. According to Procop, by accusing judges of personal responsibility for their decisions, the authorities do not raise this pressing problem. Lawyer Alexandru Velcev supported Procop and said that he is the victim of an ordered case, though he is a former employee of the prosecutor’s office, and he accuses Prosecutor-General Valeriu Balaban in this regard. Info-Prim Neo failed to obtain a reaction of the prosecutor-general regarding the accusations taken against him. The press service of the Prosecutor-General’s Office said that Valeriu Balaban will be unavailable on Tuesday afternoon and March 8.