Prosecutors unable to probe Cubreacov’s kidnapping because of Transnistria

As long as Moldova’s law enforcement bodies are denied access to the Transnistrian region for probes into the alleged abduction of the vice president of the Christian-Democratic People’s Party (PPCD), Vlad Cubreacov, the investigations will remain in a deadlock, stated Thursday Deputy Prosecutor General Vasile Pascari in reply to a formal enquiry by MP Valentina Cusnir, Info-Prim Neo reports. According to Pascari, the investigations have been running slowly because the prosecutors needed to probe a multitude of versions. Today the investigations are focused on the version that Cubreacov was held by abductors in the Transnistrian region, as well as on the version that the kidnapping was a hoax, Pascari said. Cubreacov claimed that he had been kidnapped and held somewhere in Transnistria in the period from March 21 to May 25, 2002. Based on these statements, the Moldovan prosecutors have done a great deal of work and made repeated attempts to get assistance from the law enforcement bodies of the self-proclaimed republic. But they refused to cooperate, the Deputy Prosecutor General said. According to him, in investigating the second version, a number of witnesses that had testified in 2002 were repeatedly quizzed. Two ex-PPCD members, Ion Neagu and Sergiu Burca, alleged Cubreacov’s disappearance had been staged by the leadership of the party. In order to collect more evidence for this version, these two witnesses will be confronted and cross-examined on March 11, Pascari informed. As reported by Info-Prim Neo earlier, the two former activists of PPCD, Ion Neagu and Sergiu Burca, alleged in an interview with Jurnal de Chisinau newspaper that the abduction of Cubreacov was staged by the Christian-Democrat leaders, who had him hidden in a house belonging to another Christian-Democrat MP. In their words, the plot had the purpose to discourage the Moldovan authorities from initiating proceedings against the party leaders for public disorders during protest rallies, as well as to stimulate a large turnout for a protest meeting scheduled for March 31, 2002. They also claimed that PPCD president Iurie Rosca had gone to Bucharest to request one million dollars as ransom to free Cubreacov, although Rosca himself was the brains behind the disappearance. Cubreacov disappeared on 21 March, 2002, and was found a couple of months later near a village on the Nistru. Whereas the Christian-Democrats and Cubreacov himself maintain that the Russian secret services were behind the abduction, the authorities in Tiraspol claimed they had evidence proving President Voronin’s involvement.