“I think it is absolutely normal that the heads of two institutions sometimes end up in a situation when there is a misunderstanding,” is how the head of the Anticorruption Prosecutor’s Office (PA) Veronica Dragalin commented on the rumors that appeared on several anonymous Telegram channels about a conflict between her and the director of the National Anticorruption Center (CNA) Iulian Rusu. According to the chief prosecutor of the PA, the situation presented in the public space is distorted.

Veronica Dragalin held on Friday morning, June 9, a live on the Facebook page of the Prosecutor’s Office, in which she spoke about the situation created between the two institutions, stressing that “we do not have conflicts”.

“Every employee should write a list of all close people, godfathers, brothers-in-law, whom they would not want to investigate”

According to the head of the PA, the weekly meeting of anti-corruption prosecutors took place on Monday, June 5, after which some Telegram channels allegedly posted false information about her.

“Moldova is a very small country, where many people know each other and have relations with each other. I told the staff that several times there have been situations when a complaint about a corrupt lawyer, a former prosecutor in the Anticorruption Prosecutor’s Office, reaches my desk. When something like this comes to my desk, I find it very difficult to know who in the PA I can talk to about this case, who this former prosecutor knows, because I don’t know them. I don’t know the relations between PA employees and other people in Moldova. I told the staff that this is a problem for me and I would like to find a solution. One solution I proposed was that each employee should write a list of all close people, godfathers, brothers-in-law, that they would not want to investigate. I told them that I understand that this is our private life and it would be strange to write such a list and give it to your boss, so I assured them that we wouldn’t necessarily do that, but I told them to think of a solution (…),” Dragalin recounted.

“The version that appeared on Telegram was a fake”

The chief prosecutor claims that what she discussed appeared distorted on social media.

“Later the same day, information appeared on a Telegram channel about what I said in the meeting, only the version that appeared on Telegram was a false one. It was said that I, a hysterical person, asked everyone to report to me who the in-laws, godparents and everything else were. They accused me of not respecting the conflict of interest (…)”, according to Veronica Dragalin.

Dragalin says she was not surprised by such an action, because “she says every week that there are corrupt people here in our building (AP headquarters e.d.)”.

“At 7 a.m. on Wednesday morning, I sent a message to all the prosecutors and let them know that at 9 a.m. we would have a mandatory meeting. At 8:20 a.m. I called the head of the prosecution body at the NAC, Dumitru Cucas, a person with whom I communicate very often, including about leaks (…) I told him I wanted to have a meeting with NAC officers at 9:30 a.m. Later, he confirmed that all the officers were available, but asked me to inform CNA director Iulian Rusu as well because that would be fair. I wrote a message to Mr Rusu to inform him that I will meet with the NAC officers and that we will talk including information from concrete cases, that’s why it’s right to have this meeting in a smaller format, only with the prosecution body (…). The Criminal Procedure Code does not provide a role for the NAC director (…)”, explained the head of the PA.

She says she would have explained to her colleagues how she handled a potential conflict of interest in a case involving a person she knows mentioned in that Telegram post she referred to.

“If we had concrete information that someone in this room had committed corruption”

“I wanted to tell the entire staff, including the person who leaked this information, that I am not intimidated and I repeated to them how important it is to remove corrupt people from our institution. I told them that if we had concrete information that someone in this room had committed corruption, I as head would not protect them. If we have evidence, it is very important to hold such people accountable (…)”, Veronica Dragalin added.

Then came the meeting with NAC officers, which was attended by the director of the institution, who insisted on being present, asking his subordinates to clear the room, according to the head of the PA.

“It was a regrettable situation, I don’t think it was right that it happened but maybe I contributed to the problem created. I didn’t think of talking to the director because I was thinking about many other things. I think if I had spoken to him, this would not have happened. I think it is absolutely normal that the heads of two institutions sometimes end up in a situation where there is a misunderstanding. It is not specific to Moldova, and in the United States such things often happen (…)”, Dragalin concluded.

Asked by ZdG, the NAC spokeswoman said the institution does not comment.

On Wednesday, June 7, realitatea.md published a document, writing that CNA officers had filed a collective complaint on behalf of PA head Veronica DragaliN accusing her of intimidation.

Crime-moldova.com wrote that Veronica Dragalin had threatened her subordinates with searches and files and asked those “who feel like they have a fly on their head to voluntarily resign in order to avoid this”.

The NAC report for 2022 presented to the Parliament plenary. Iulian Rusu: “Relations with PA and PG are unclear lately”

The director of the National Anti-Corruption Centre (NAC), Iulian Rusu, presented on Friday, 12 May, the NAC’s activity report for 2022. According to the document, over the past year, NAC investigative officers have detected 539 crimes, 401 of which were corruption offences. Also during the past year, the Agency for the Recovery of Criminal Assets, which is a specialized autonomous subdivision within the NAC, applied seizures worth two billion lei.

After the presentation of the activity report, when asked about the connections with the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office, the NAC Director said that “relations with the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office and the General Prosecutor’s Office have been unclear lately”.