Moldova prisoner to oligarch: ‘You could find yourself in our place’

Deeply disrespected by me and (judging by the results of public opinion polls) the majority of the population of Moldova, Vladimir Georgievich Plahotniuc:

Surely in the entourage of the main raider of the country, are there not adequate counselors who could finally open your eyes to the real situation in the country? Surely in an organized criminal group called the Democratic Party, are there not some left who, at least based on the instinct for self-preservation (inherent even in animals), understand that you cannot endlessly deceive the people, that concerts by Kirkorov cannot distract people’s attention from the billions stolen by you and your accomplices, that criminal cases against opposition demonstrations and the arrest of [Grigory] Petrenko and his companions cannot intimidate other protesters? You can deceive some people for a long time, but you cannot endlessly fool everyone.

Today, Vladimir Georgievich, both the left and right are against you; those for Eurasian integration, as well as those who favor European integration. As a politician with a negative rating equal to the population of Moldova, despite the employees of Argus [Plahotniuc’s private security agency] and the promoters in your media, you need to understand that not all are complacent.

I also recommend that you consult your doctor. After all, with the onset of autumn your allergies are aggravated: on the eve of parliamentary elections in 2014 the anti-fascists were arrested, to intimidate the population and prevent protests against the dirtiest election in the history of Moldova. And today you hold the Petrenko group captive, to threaten the other protesters in the center of Chisinau.

According to one of the prosecutors leading our criminal case at Riscani, the real reason for our arrest was your well-known personal resentment of the longtime criticism of Grigory Petrenko. I didn’t know you were so vulnerable, oligarch Vladimir Georgievich, but even so, where does Grigory Petrenko rank among your other personal enemies?

Strange, but somehow a person who calls his hotel Nobil (after noble manners) uses ignoble methods of pressure on relatives of his personal opponents. It seemed insufficient to you to arrest Grigory Petrenko, so you started a criminal investigation against his mother, and then planted grenades in the car of Grigory’s wife, Lily Petrenko. We can talk more about the fact that you are personally involved in all these abominations, such as when the leadership of the PCRM [the traitorous “Communist Party” of the Republic of Moldova] offered to have the case against Grigory’s mother closed in exchange for abandoning criticism of you. It turns out that you have nothing noble besides the name of the hotel. Conventional methods of cheaters and swindlers.

By the way, about the hotel. It just so happens that I see the Nobil sign daily from the window of my prison cell, which is built on Mateevici street (formerly Garden), where, below the Memorial of Military Glory, weapons of the war years used to be located. Using this epistolary form, I want to ask you, what made you place your hotel in this location with a view overlooking the prison on one side and the Armenian cemetery on the other? A strange sense of aesthetic contemplation …

Speaking of the cemetery. Recently Oleg Buzni, our comrade, imprisoned for protesting since September 6 in spite of insulin-dependent diabetes, learned that his grandfather died. According to Oleg, the old man’s heart failed under the pressure of propaganda against his grandson, who he had seen in the reports of the Oligarch TV holdings. He couldn’t survive the lie that his grandson was an extremist worthy of being behind prison bars. The conclusion as to whether Roman Mihaesha, Valeria Renita and other media advocates of Plahotniuc should be considered “killers,” I will leave to the readers. You honor and celebrate the nobility of the Ministry of Justice, which is now subordinated to the Democratic Party, and which refused to escort Oleg Buzni to the funeral of his grandfather. Yet so many “Fuldzher” [Moldovan Special Forces] appeared at our court hearings for show. Apparently the authorities in our country only work for your TV cameras.

If you are really hurt and offended by the opposition, as the Riscani prosecutors say, and this letter to you does not seem politically correct on my part, I want to remind you that during the past year, the 26th year of my life (admit it, this is not the worst age in a person’s life), I have spent more time in custody (7 months in prison and a month under house arrest) than outside. And I have been deprived of my freedom and ability to communicate with friends and relatives on trumped-up charges ordered by the real criminals. What political correctness could there possibly be?

I hope you understand that if anything happens to the political prisoners while in prison, controlled by your Ministry of Justice, the slave of your Democratic Party, or to their relatives, the personal responsibility for it will fall on you. And life is such an unpredictable thing, you could still find yourself in our place. To me, you certainly are not exempt from prison, but rather should be grateful that for the last 20 years in Moldova there has been a moratorium on the death penalty…

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Translated by Greg Butterfield