In a document seen by POLITICO and circulated by Moldova to EU officials shortly after the parliamentary election, the government documented how Orthodox priests in the country had received “instructions to spread disinformation seven days a week instead of only on Sundays.” Moscow also offered people in the country “guidance on how to set up and manage Telegram channels,” a messaging platform popular in Russia.
The government has also highlighted the use of large-scale vote-buying networks, staged protests, cyberattacks, troll farms and AI-generated deepfakes — with Russian proxies paid, sometimes in cryptocurrency, according to a performance-based system of financial bonuses.
Moldova said it has been dismantling networks of foreign-trained operatives sponsored by Moscow since 2024. “We are talking here about trainings organized in Serbia, in Bosnia-Herzegovina and in the Russian Federation,” said Misail-Nichitin, the interior minister.
Misail-Nichitin said that cases like the one against Prizenco show how the networks that targeted Moldova have stretched their operations beyond the country’s borders. As a recent example she pointed to an alleged plot to assassinate several public figures in Ukraine.
“We are talking about more than 90 targets, spanning high-profile journalists, defense officials, high-level executives linked to Ukraine’s critical infrastructure, who were going to be assassinated on command,” she said.
Recruiters in that operation, she said, targeted “vulnerable young men” with no criminal records and with EU passports, if possible, some of them as young as 14 or 15 years of age.