Moldova has carried out more than 200 raids over alleged Russian-backed efforts to destabilise the country ahead of Sunday's parliamentary election, as President Maida Sandu warned Moscow was spending hundreds of millions of euros to sway the vote.
The national police said investigators and security forces had conducted 250 searches against more than 100 people, but did not specify any of the targets' political affiliations.
"The searches are related to a criminal case into the preparation of mass riots and destabilisation, which were coordinated from the Russian Federation through criminal elements," it said in a statement on Tuesday.
At a briefing in the capital, Chisinau, security officials alleged that Moldovan citizens were being trained in Serbia on protest tactics by Russian intelligence operatives. Authorities arrested 74 people as a result of the searches, security officials said.
The high-stakes poll could be pivotal for Moldova's bid to join the European Union, a process it says Moscow is attempting to derail through tactics like disinformation, organising mass riots, and vote-buying.
‘Most consequential election’
Sandu, who has described Sunday's vote as the "most consequential election" in Moldova's history, has accused Moscow of waging a subversive campaign to sway the poll to keep Chisinau within its orbit.
Last month, fugitive tycoon Ilan Shor, who has been sanctioned by the US and EU as an alleged Russian agent, openly offered Moldovans monthly payments of $3,000 to join anti-government protests.
In a video address on Monday, Sandu warned Moldova's sovereignty was "in danger" and that Russian meddling would have far-reaching consequences for Europe.
"The Kremlin is pouring hundreds of millions of euros to buy hundreds of thousands of votes on both banks of the Nistru river and abroad," she said.
"People are intoxicated daily with lies. Hundreds of individuals are paid to provoke disorder, violence, and spread fear."
Raids are to 'silence us': former president
The co-leader of Moldova's pro-Russian Patriotic Bloc, which is expected to pose a stiff challenge to the ruling pro-European Party of Action and Solidarity, had earlier said some members had been targeted in the raids.
"The criminal PAS regime is trying to intimidate us, frighten the people, and silence us," Igor Dodon, a former president, said on the Telegram messaging app.
"Hundreds of daily searches and attacks on our colleagues... demonstrate Maia Sandu's fear of the election results. They know they are going to lose these elections," he said during a press conference.
While most surveys done ahead of the elections show PAS in the lead, analysts say the outcome of Sunday's vote is unpredictable.
Under Sandu's presidency, Moldova started EU accession talks last year.
Russia has denied interfering in Moldova's domestic affairs and says that Sandu's government is stoking anti-Russian sentiment to win votes.
The Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) on Tuesday accused the EU of having intentions "to occupy Moldova".
The EU and NATO are "determined to keep Moldova in line with their Russophobic policy," Russian state news agency TASS said, citing the press bureau of the SVR.
"They plan to do this at any cost, including by introducing troops and de facto occupying the country. At this stage, a concentration of armed forces units from NATO countries is being carried out in Romania near the Moldovan borders," the agency said.
It is internationally recognised as part of Moldova. However, since a brief war in 1992, it has functioned as a de facto independent state with its own government, military, currency, and passport system.
Its strategic location and the presence of a large, ageing Soviet-era weapons depot make it a potential flashpoint, especially in the context of the war in Ukraine.
