“The formation of a parliamentary majority that is based on people featured in the Kroll report would be a very big obstacle in the European Union’s cooperation with the Republic of Moldova,” said the Head of the EU Delegation to Moldova Peter Michalko. In an interview for IPN, the ambassador said the persons to blame for the banking fraud should stay in jail.

The EU official stated the banking fraud committed in the Republics of Moldova caused extraordinary damage to the country and will be felt by every citizen as they will have to pay for this fraud. The people who committed this huge crime should be punished. “The rule of law and the judiciary system should work in the Republic of Moldova as they normally do in a European country. The people to blame for this crime should be jailed, should be punished,” said Peter Michalko.

He considers it is important for the Republic of Moldova to make requests to the countries that have connection with this fraud for standard cooperation in investigation so as to identify the money stolen from Moldova’s banking system and also those who took part in this theft.

“These activities should take place now already as we see that if justice does not work, if the rule of law does not work, this can have consequences even for the political system. And this was one of the risks emphasized by the Venice Commission and OSCE/ODIHR - the risk of economic interests that can influence the political sphere,” noted Peter Michalko.

In another development, referring to the justice sector, the EU ambassador said no suspicions of selective attitude that can lead to the violation of the right to a fair trial should exist. The aspects related to the human rights and freedoms will be further followed by the EU attentively as these are the main criterion for assessing the state of democracy and the rule of law in the Republic of Moldova.