The use of balaclavas, masks and other articles that hide the person’s identity in protests and other mass events, held in public places, must be immediately banned by law. When such a law is adopted, the law enforcement bodies must determinedly foil from the start any attempt to use them so as to prevent provocations similar to those witnessed in Ukraine.

The need of such acts became evident in the demonstration staged by representatives of the sexual minorities in Chisinau on May 17, on the one hand, and by counterdemonstrators, on the other hand. A part of the counterdemonstrators wore masks on their faces. Given the particularities of the confrontations in Ukraine, this fact generated a dose of concern and even fear in Moldovan society. It’s true that there were only several cases of the kind and it is only a start of fear, but this is why prompt and definite actions must be taken as a scared society can be led by the nose anywhere, anytime and by anyone, including forward or backward, to the left or to the right, towards the Customs Union or the European Union, before, during and after the elections, and in the absence of elections.

The people who wore masks in Chisinau on May 17 do not yet look like the ‘little green men’ with masks and balaclavas from Crimea, Donetsk or Luhansk, but certain resemblance starts to take shape. What do the ‘masks’ from Chisinau hide if they are fully free to assemble and to express themselves in Moldova? The possible answers are not too many and the most plausible of those few is that the identity is hidden because illegal actions will follow after the expression of opinions. The subsequent actions can be aimed against the sexual minorities or the sexual minorities can be used as a pretext for other actions with different targets and goals. The Ukrainian model, for example, included actions aimed against state institutions, with masks and balaclavas or without, with Kalashnikov guns or without. These fears may be exaggerated, but the ‘Ukrainian borsch’ teaches us to blow in the ‘Moldovan yogurt’ as well until it is not too late.

Even if there were not very many, the organized presence of masks at the demonstration shows that there is a center coordinating them. Until a relevant law is passed, the competent state bodies should examine the situation to see if more masks or balaclavas started to be produced, imported, purchased or stored. We do not refer to arms because the rules in this respect are clear and we hope that the state bodies have the necessary powers. Investigations can be also carried out to examine past or future periods and the present situation too.

We do not yet include the Ribbon of St George in the list of articles that can be banned by law. They say that Kazakhstan already banned it as a symbol of a danger coming from outside the country. In fact, the given ribbon is or was worn by almost all those who wear or wore masks, balaclavas and Kalashnikov guns in Ukraine. In a normal country, as Moldova wants to be, any person and any organization must enjoy the right to wear any ribbon they want, if this is not against the law and if the given right is not used against the right of other people to wear other emblems or not to wear the Ribbon of St Gheorghe.

Anyway, the accusations that the Moldovan leaders didn’t wear the given ribbon on May 9 seem not fully legal, including because the way in which were expressed looks more like intimidation and even threat. For example, last week the leader of the Association “Rodina – Evroaziiskii Soiuz” told a news conference that by not wearing the Ribbon of Saint George on May 9 the Moldovan elite promoted the falsification of history and wanted to present the Soviet victories in a different light, and this will have serious consequences. “We would like to remind them that we won in 1945. We will make those who forgot it remember it,” he stated. It seems that the time when a symbol was to be obligatorily worn by everyone ended when fascism capitulated on May 9, 1945…

The ban on using in public places articles that cause disquiet, fear and dangers in Moldovan society must be imposed not in any way, but by law because all the rights and freedoms and all the obligations and dangers in a normal country must be regulated by law. No person or institution can use them as they want.

Valeriu Vasilică, IPN