Pro-Russian opposition leader Igor Dodon’s home was searched and cash seized amid allegations he took a bribe from an oligarch and received instructions from the Kremlin.
Moldovan former president Igor Dodon, leader of the Socialists and Communists block, gestures during a press conference at the headquarters of his party in Chisinau, Moldova, on October 8, 2021. Photo: EPA-EFE/Dumitru Doru
Pro-Russian former Moldovan President Igor Dodon was detained by prosecutors on Tuesday on four charges including corruption and treason.
Investigators searched Dodon’s Chisinau home, his mother’s house and a villa being built by the Dodon family by the Dniester River, seizing tens of thousands of euros in cash and half a million lei [25,000 euros], anti-graft prosecutors said.
Dodon, who was president between 2016 and 2020 but lost a bid for re-election to pro-European challenger Maia Sandu, is de facto leader of the opposition Socialist Party of Moldova, PSRM.
The Office of the Moldovan Prosecutor General opened a corruption investigation against him on May 18 on suspicion that, in June 2019, the then president took a cash bribe in a black plastic bag from oligarch and political leader Vladimir Plahotniuc, who later fled Moldova.
Prosecutors are also probing media report that Dodon received instructions from the Kremlin concerning speeches he made outside of Moldova.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Dodon’s detention was an “internal affair” of Moldova, but that it was nevertheless alarming.
“We are alarmed that again such a practice and persecution is being used against those who are supporters of the development of friendly and mutually beneficial relations with the Russian Federation,” he said.
Following news of Dodon’s detention, a couple of dozen supporters and several PSRM deputies gathered in front of parliament in Chisinau.
PSRM executive secretary Vlad Batrancea called the detention a “cheap show.”
“When a government is unable to lead the country, it fights the opposition,” he said.
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