Moldovan Parliament

The Moldovan district of Taraclia, populated mainly by Bulgarians, will preserve its integrity, which will guarantee the rights of the Bulgarian community there. Vice President Iliana Yotova received this assurance from the Speaker of the Moldovan Parliament, Igor Grosu. The Vice President is visiting Chisinau today.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova accused Romania of occupying Bessarabia until 1940. She was angered by a Romanian Foreign Ministry announcement praising the replacement of the Moldovan language with Romanian in all Moldovan laws as a "restoration of scientific truth".

Moldova will hand over the building of the former Theological Seminary in Chisinau to the Metropolis of Bessarabia, which is linked to the Romanian Orthodox Church, if a draft law registered by several deputies of the ruling Action and Solidarity Party, PAS, is adopted.

The director of Moldova's National Anti-Corruption Centre, Iulian Rusu, announced on Monday evening the seizure of oligarch Ilan Shor's assets in the country.

"The seizures applied by the Criminal Assets Recovery Agency reached the amount of 1.5 billion lei [about 75 million euros]. These are properties from Moldova," Rusu told TV8.

This was stated today by the spokesperson of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Maria Zakharova, after Moldova banned the broadcasting of Russian television channels, but also that the Russian St. George's Ribbon is banned from showing publicly.

The Alliance for the Union of Romanians, AUR announced on Monday that it plans to open branches in neighbouring Moldova as part of its campaign to reunify the country with Romania.

The AUR, which has 47 MPs in the 465-seat Romania parliament, is a nationalist party with a religious-based, anti-LGBT orientation and wants to impose a conservative, "patriotic" education system.

Eleven Socialist Party deputies signed a draft bill on Thursday designed to reduce the powers of the National Integrity Authority, the body which verifies the legality of assets and conflicts of interests among state employees.

Romania is condemning the "non-transparent and contrary to democratic practices" way in which the Party of Socialists of Republic of Moldova (PSRM) and the For Moldova Platform, which includes the Sor Party, acted on December 3 in the Moldovan Parliament, blatantly ignoring the massive vote expressed by the citizens of Moldova in the November 15 presidential election.

The US embassy in Moldova reacted angrily on Thursday after the Moldovan parliament cancelled the sale of the former Republican Stadium in Chisinau intended for a new US embassy.

Moldova's General Prosecutor, Alexandr Stoianoglo, on Monday said the fugitive tycoon Vlad Plahotniuc, the former leader of the Democratic Party, PD, had illegally got hold of 100 million US dollars from the banking system.