WEAPONS SOLD TO TERRORISTS
Nezavisimaya Gazeta, Russia
Nov 14 2013
by Svetlana Gamova
MOLDOVAN PARLIAMENTARIAN CLAIMS THAT THE REGIME DECEIVED THE UN AND
SOLD WEAPONS TO TERRORISTS; Official Kishinev is accused of the sale
of military hardware to terrorists.
Grigori Petrenko, deputy of the parliament of Moldova and member of
the Moldovan delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly, said that some
weapons from army depots had been sold to Libya in 2011 and that these
weapons had ended up in terrorists’ hands. Petrenko said that this fact
was mentioned in the EU report… and that the faction of the Moldovan
Communist Party was going to demand prime minister’s resignation.
Petrenko said that UN experts examined the situation in Libya when
a civil war had been raging there and when some countries had been
sending weapons to this country despite the UN. Moldova had been one
of these countries, he said.
The lawmaker was talking about the scandal with the IL-76 plane
from Bengasi that landed in Kishinev on September 12, 2011, moved to
Markulesty and eventually took off bound for Yerevan, Armenia. It was
loaded with ordnance and rockets (Fagot, Konkurs, Shturm-S, Metis). In
fact, the contract even included expensive antitank missile launchers.
Moldovan Defense Ministry Press Secretary Alexander Josan later said
that the matter only concerned artillery pieces worth over $5 million.
According to what information was available to the parliament, the
cargo was meant for Armenia, a country with a latent conflict with
Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh. The parliament set up a special
commission to investigate the matter. The government (it was headed by
Vlad Filat then) disassociated itself from the arms deal and pinned
all the blame for it on the Defense Ministry. The military, however,
announced that the initiative had been its political masters’.
Brigadier General Yuri Dominik, the man who said it, resigned shortly
afterwards. The matter was gradually forgotten… but not everywhere.
Enraged that the Moldovans had been arming Armenia, Azerbaijani
President Ilham Aliyev turned down Kishinev’s suggestions to start
up joint energy projects.
Some Latvian intermediary was involved in the controversial deal. The
Latvian Foreign Ministry said that there had never been a company
under such a name but the Moldovan Defense Ministry chose to stick
to its guns. Its spokesman said, “The contract was signed with
Latspeceksports, a company from Latvia. It was this company that
found the customer.”
… Petrenko said, “We never managed to discover the customer’s
identity then but we do know it now. There is the UN report with
evidence… that these weapons were shipped to Libya.”
According to UN experts, before landing in Moldova, the IL-76 brought
ordnance to Libya. Later on, the same plane made three runs from
Tirana to Bengasi which was not on its flight plans. To quote Petrenko,
“There are no reasons to believe that the weapons from Moldovan army
depots stayed in Armenia. On the contrary, there are indications
that they ended up in Libya… specifically in the areas that were
controlled by Al-Qaeda then.” The lawmaker added that the UN had
accused the Moldovan authorities of being thoroughly uncooperative.
“Once the parliament meets, we will suggest reestablishment of the
investigation commission. And we will demand immediate resignation
of Prosecutor General Yuri Lyanke as a person involved in this crime,
as someone who broke international laws while being a foreign minister
of a sovereign country,” said Petrenko.
[Translated from Russian]
From: A. Papazian