CHISINAU (Reuters) - Moldova expelled three Russian diplomats on Monday after it accused Russia's embassy of engineering the escape of a pro-Kremlin lawmaker to prevent him being jailed in a case over illegal political funding.
The case of Alexander Nesterovschii, who could not be reached for comment, is the latest in which Moldova's pro-European government has accused Russia of meddling in its domestic politics. Moscow denies the accusation.
"Interference by the Russian Federation with the judicial system of the Republic of Moldova is unacceptable. Imagine that the Republic of Moldova interfered with justice in the Russian Federation," President Maia Sandu told Radio Moldova.
The Russian ambassador to Moldova, Oleg Ozerov, said the accusation of meddling was unfounded and unsubstantiated.
Moldova's security service released a video which it said showed Nesterovschii entering the Russian embassy in Chisinau on March 18, a day before a court sentenced him in absentia to 12 years in jail.
He was found guilty of illegally channelling money to a pro-Russian party associated with fugitive businessman Ilan Shor at local elections in 2023, as well as the 2024 presidential vote and a national referendum on Moldova's EU aspirations.
Nesterovschii denied the charges, calling them politically motivated.
The security service said that on the day of his sentencing he was driven in a white car with diplomatic plates to the Russian-backed Transdniestria region that broke away from Moldovan control in the early 1990s.
"This type of activity is part of the mechanism of hybrid aggression directed against the Republic of Moldova," Alexandru Musteata, director of Moldova's Security and Intelligence Service, told a briefing.
Moldova's government, which aims to take the former Soviet republic into the European Union by 2030, has repeatedly accused Russia of meddling and trying to destabilise it.
Moldova holds a parliamentary election this autumn that will be a test of the popularity of the pro-EU government's course.
Moldovan authorities said last Tuesday they had detained Eugenia Gutul, a pro-Russian governor of Moldova's Gagauzia region, on charges of illegal political funding as she tried to leave the country. Gutul said the charges were politically motivated.
A court ruling then ordered her to be kept in custody for at least 30 days.
Police say another lawmaker, Irinna Lozovan, who is facing similar charges, is hiding from law enforcement. Lozovan also said the charges were politically motivated.
(This story has been refiled to fix a typo in Alexander Nesterovschii's name in paragraph 7)
(Reporting by Alexander Tanas; writing by Yuliia Dysa; editing by Tom Balmforth, Mark Heinrich and Gareth Jones)
