The opposition demanded that the head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Daniela Misașil-Nichitin, and the head of the Border Police, Ruslan Galușca, be heard in parliament in connection with strange detentions of journalists at the airport before departure.
PSRM MP Bogdan Țîrdea raised this issue at the plenary session of parliament on September 23. The occasion was several high-profile cases in which people who are not members of the ruling party were subjected to hours-long inspections at the border.
“There are several high-profile cases. Journalist and publicist Dmitri Chubashenko was held at the border for several hours. Journalist Vlad Cubreacov, a parliamentary adviser to AUR in Romania, was also subjected to inspection. And Denis Vyatkin was not allowed to leave the territory of Moldova,” the MP stated.
Țîrdea demanded that the security services explain the selection criteria for such inspections. His phrasing has already spread across Telegram channels and social media.
“Several questions arise: what is the reason for these inspections? The shape of the skull? The wrong ethnic origin? The fact that they are not members of PAS? We also want to understand. Maybe we are a hybrid regime, but it seems we are not yet Sudan, Eritrea, and other dictatorships!” Țîrdea stated.
Who Exactly Was Affected?
Dmitri Chubashenko is a well-known figure in Moldova. A journalist since 1985, co-founder of the Infotag agency, founder of the newspaper Moldavskie Vedomosti, at various times he ran for parliament and for the presidency. In 2025, together with journalist Liudmila Belchenkova and former Defense Minister Victor Gaiciuc, he announced the creation of the platform “For Moldova” — an independent initiative positioning itself as an alternative to the current government. In recent years, Chubashenko has been active as a political commentator.
Vlad Cubreacov is a former MP of Moldova’s parliament from the Christian Democratic People’s Front, now a parliamentary adviser to the Romanian AUR party. He is known as an active participant in the church schism in Moldova: in 1992 he took part in the creation of the “Bessarabian Metropolitanate,” and later represented its interests at the European Court of Human Rights.
According to Moldovan media, Cubreacov was subjected to “second-line control” twice during the summer of 2026 — on August 17 upon entering Moldova and on August 31 upon returning to Romania. In his blog, he described that the questions concerned the “Bessarabian Metropolitanate,” its new “metropolitan” Antonie, as well as Cubreacov’s ties to the AUR party. The conversation with him, according to his account, was conducted by a man in civilian clothes who introduced himself as an SIS officer.
Denis Vyatkin is a journalist who, according to media reports, was not allowed to travel to Yekaterinburg to participate in the International Youth Festival.
The PAS parliamentary majority rejected Țîrdea’s initiative. The deputies did not agree to hear Misașil-Nichitin and Galușca.
Țîrdea himself, commenting on the situation, posed a question that, apparently, concerns not only him: “What is the reason for these inadequate actions?”
