Finances
PROSECUTOR GENERAL SAYS THAT BESIDES THE BANK FRAUD INVESTIGATION, OTHER HIGH-PROFILE CASES WERE RUN AS WELL
Prosecutor General Alexander Stoianoglo stated at a press briefing on Tuesday that during the first year of his mandate, besides the one-billion-dollar bank fraud, other high-profile cases were investigated as well.
Stoianoglo is convinced that at its initial stage, the bank fraud investigation was purposefully misdirected in order to conceal the names of fraud authors and of fraud beneficiaries.
“Unfortunately, all those actions were done by our former colleagues – the prosecutors who were dismissed one year ago. They had falsified whole episodes of crimes, and brought charges against tens of people, of whom some have already been sued by courts and are serving sentences in prison”, said Stoianoglo.
The Prosecutor General stressed that during the last year, new episodes and crime participants had been revealed.
“For instance, the Prosecution Service has accomplished the investigation into the involvement of a Moldovan bank and its top managers into the one-billion-dollar bank fraud. So far, this bank has not been included into the fraud case. But it has been established that up to 2 billion lei was removed from the country through it. We are investigating the involvement of other banks into the fraud, including foreign ones. And we shall make a legal assessment of the actions by then-governors of those banks, in particular by Ilan Sor”, assured Alexander Stoianoglo.
The Prosecutor General accused of unlawful doings “the entire leadership of the National Bank of Moldova [NBM] in 2009-2011”.
“The NBM had played a key role in embezzling “the billion” by providing legal and banking consultancies during the money withdrawal. Presently whole companies and individuals, who removed tens of millions of U.S. dollars out of the Moldovan banking system, are under investigation”, said Alexander Stoianoglo.
Among the high-profile cases of last 12 months, the Prosecutor General mentioned the Metalferos case and the case of the Loteria Moldovei state-private partnership.
“Our prosecutors have established that at purchase and sale of metal scraps by using shady schemes, the state-run Metalferos Company suffered damage totaling tens of millions of U.S. dollars [equivalent]. The main beneficiary of the metal schemes is the former leader of the Democratic Party of Moldova, Vladimir Plahotniuc”, stated the Prosecutor General confidently.
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