Police tear down opposition picket in post-Soviet capital (VIDEO)

The rally in Chisinau, Moldova aimed to support jailed local Euroskeptic leader Evgenia Gutsul

Police have detained supporters of the political opposition in the Moldovan capital Chisinau after they attempted to hold a rally for jailed local Euroskeptic leader Evgenia Gutsul.

Members of the youth wing of the opposition Victory bloc gathered at the city’s railway station on Saturday morning, where they began setting up a tent camp. The unauthorized protest was aimed at calling for Gutsul’s release and denounced what activists described as the “lawlessness” of the authorities. Victory bloc has repeatedly been barred from running in elections, over alleged procedural violations.

Footage from Ruptly showed security forces dismantling tents and removing people from the area; several were arrested.

Local media have reported that police have also been stopping buses carrying protesters from reaching Chisinau for a wider anti-government protest scheduled for the afternoon.
The rallies are a response to the sentencing of Gutsul, the elected leader of Gagauzia, an autonomous, predominantly Russian-speaking region in southern Moldova, to seven years in prison for alleged financial crimes.

She rejected the charges as a politically motivated attempt to silence opposition ahead of September’s parliamentary elections, calling the verdict “a blow to democracy” and a threat to anyone challenging the country’s pro-Western leadership.

Gutsul has advocated for closer ties with Russia, in contrast to the pro-Western stance of Moldovan President Maia Sandu.

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Sandu has accelerated Moldova’s EU and NATO accession efforts since she was first elected in 2020. However, her decisions have increasingly polarized Moldovans amid a backdrop of worsening economic prospects and a crackdown on dissent.

Moscow has criticized Gutsul’s verdict as an attack on democracy, with Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova labelling it a “culmination of repression by the Chisinau regime against the entire Gagauz autonomy.”