Moldova's CEC: Elections are valid VIDEO

The parliamentary elections in Moldova have been recognized as valid. Voting is taking place without serious violations, although some incidents have still been registered. This was announced today by the country's Central Election Commission, Ukrinform reports, quoted by FOCUS.

According to its data, by 2:30 p.m. local time, 33% of the country's citizens included in the voter lists had voted. According to the Constitution of Moldova, this is enough to recognize the elections as held.

As of 15:30 Bulgarian time, over 1.1 million voters, or 37.5%, had voted in the parliamentary elections in Moldova, exceeding the minimum required 33.33%.

Polling stations opened at 7:00 local time and will operate until 21:00. In total, 1973 polling stations operate in the country, including 12 for residents of the Transnistrian region.

15 parties, 4 electoral blocs and 4 independent candidates are participating in the elections. The elections are recognized as held if at least 30% of voters vote. The threshold is 5% for a party, 7% for blocs and 2% for independent candidates.

Moldovan Prime Minister Dorin Ressan announced earlier that on Saturday and Sunday the country's electoral infrastructure suffered a series of cyberattacks, due to which about 4 thousand websites stopped working, NewsMaker writes.

According to him, this happened after the Information Technology and Cybersecurity Service (STISC), subordinate to the government, blocked a platform due to a large-scale cyberattack on the electoral infrastructure.

"Yesterday and today, the infrastructure related to the electoral process was subjected to several attempts at cyberattacks. This applies in particular to CEC.md, as well as to a number of polling stations outside the country. "We detected and neutralized all attacks in real time, without harming the electoral process," the prime minister said.

According to the government's Telegram channel, the cyberattacks targeted the CEC.md platform, state cloud services, automated systems, as well as some polling stations abroad.

According to the NewsMaker publication, the Promo-LEX observation mission has so far registered 254 confirmed violations of the voting process. Among the most common are violations of the secrecy of the vote (85 cases, mainly photographing ballots) and group voting (30 cases).

Illegal campaigning and the presence of unauthorized persons in polling stations have also been registered. There are also problems with voter lists, and hundreds of polling stations are not accessible to people with disabilities.

Furthermore, the Moldovan Ministry of Foreign Affairs reported receiving bomb threats at a number of foreign polling stations, as well as at home. These include polling stations in Brussels (Belgium), Rome and Genoa (Italy), Bucharest (Romania), Asheville (USA) and Alicante (Spain).

"The mining signals started just as the authorities had warned in advance that this would happen as part of the Russian Federation's interference in the electoral process in the Republic of Moldova“, the report said.

The ministry added that "state institutions have prepared for such a scenario, we have established clear procedures and are cooperating with our partners from other countries so that the electoral process does not suffer“.

"Election surveillance cameras installed in polling stations are functioning and monitoring the electoral instruments so that they remain intact until the resumption of the electoral processes“, the Moldovan foreign ministry noted.

The parliamentary elections on September 28 are seen as a key moment for the future of Moldova, a candidate country for EU membership. The ruling pro-European ''Party of Action and Solidarity (PAS), led by President Maia Sandu, has held a parliamentary majority since 2021. However, polls show that it could lose that majority as opposition parties try to attract voters concerned about rising prices, poverty and a slowing economy. The need to form a coalition government could complicate the PDP's efforts to join the EU by 2030, analysts say.

President of the Republic of Moldova Maia Sandu has earlier urged voters to support pro-European forces, stressing that Russia has invested a lot of money to bring its allies to power. According to Sandu, Moscow has spent “hundreds of millions of dollars“ trying to buy the votes of Moldovan citizens. According to her, if the pro-Russian forces win, Moldova will be cut off from Europe and could become a springboard for Russian operations in the Odessa region.

Russia claims that it does not interfere in the internal politics of other countries.