Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty: Moldova's Orthodox Church Lashes Out At 'Anti-Christ Plot' To Develop Virus Vaccine

 The Moscow-affiliated Moldovan Orthodox Church has called on the country's leadership to ensure that a potential future anti-coronavirus vaccine will not be made compulsory, claiming conspiracy by a "world anti-Christ system" that will allegedly insert microchips into humans to control them via 5G technology. [...]

Such accusations are also present in the Moldovan church's statement, which says that "Bill Gates is considered the man responsible for the creation of a technology allowing people to be microchipped through a vaccine that would insert in their bodies nanoparticles that interact with 5G waves and allow people to be remotely controlled." [...]

The Moldovan Orthodox Church is autonomous but operates under the jurisdiction of the Russian Orthodox Church. The Romanian Orthodox Church's Metropolis of Bessarabia is the country's other major church.

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Politico: What Putin Got From the Trump-Zelensky Phone Call

Five years on, it’s still a hot war, with Russia constantly pushing forward the line of occupation. Some 1.5 million people have been displaced. The shifting mass of regular and irregular Russian troops in eastern Ukraine — soldiers and mercenaries; “separatist” proxies and militias; a lot of guys with pseudonyms using advanced Russian weaponry that Russia claims must have been bought at the local corner shop (note: it is supplied from Russia) — constantly test and adapt new capabilities, especially electronic warfare capabilities, on the battlefield. [...]

The dirty, confusing, irregular conflict in Ukraine is part of a broader political war waged by the Kremlin. In countless ways, this is the inevitable evolution of Russia’s aggression against its neighbors after Putin paid so little price for invading Georgia in 2008. I worked as an adviser to the Georgian government in the years after that war, and we watched as almost everyone normalized Putin’s behavior, emboldening him to press forward. Now, Russia’s army sniper school has been transferred to the Ukrainian front, training the next generation of elite Russian marksmen by having them pick off Ukrainian soldiers. Soldiers like Baklanova. [...]

Since the annexation of Crimea, there has been a lot of speculation about Putin’s long-term goals for Ukraine and the region, be it rebuilding a kind of Russian empire or disrupting what he views as another empire moving toward his borders. But in the near term, Putin knows that pushing for a pro-Kremlin alignment in Ukrainian politics — especially with the war still on — is a waste of effort. Far better to hope for what has succeeded elsewhere along the Russian rim, and in Europe, and in the United States: the sense that it would be nice to get along better with Russia, because it’s exhausting to live under a constant existential threat.

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statista: The worst countries to be gay in Europe

The latest edition of ILGA Europe's Rainbow List has found that Malta, Belgium and Norway are the most LGBTI-friendly countries in Europe. The annual review ranks 49 European countries on a scale from 0 percent to 100 percent. Those closer to 0 percent are considered worst for gross violations of human rights and discrimination while the other end of the scale respects human rights and full equality.

LGBTI people planning a trip are best advised to avoid Turkey, Armenia and Azerbeijan. The latter is rock-bottom of the ranking with 4.70 percent. Russia, host of the 2018 FIFA World Cup, also scores poorly on the list with 10.90 percent.

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The Calvert Journal: My Gay Exorcism: LGBTQ activist undergoes religious ritual in Moldova for new documentary

When documentary maker and activist Nik Jovčić-Sas agreed to undergo an exorcism to purge the “demons” that made him gay, he took a step into the unknown. All he knew about the ritual, carried out in a remote monastery in the mountains of Moldova, was that it involved a knife. [...]

Eventually the documentary maker discovered queer-affirming theologians who helped him reconcile his sexual orientation with Christian scripture. He went on to create his own YouTube channel, Orthodox Provocateur, to tell other LGBTQ believers that they also didn’t have to choose between faith and falling in love. [...]

“Orthodox Christianity has seen a growth in popularity in the past 20 years, but unfortunately this resurgence is often more grounded in cheap ritualism and nationalist politics than genuine faith or devotion to Christ,” he says. “The increase of exorcisms in eastern Europe is a symptom of that. What makes me most upset is the way that these rituals prey on some of the most vulnerable people in our communities. These exorcisms need to be a thing of the past — they have no place in the modern world.”

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Bloomberg: Europe’s Depopulation Time Bomb Is Ticking in the Baltics

The trend is hitting especially hard in the Baltics. Latvia, with a current population of 1.96 million, has lost about 25 percent of its residents since throwing off Soviet control in 1991. The UN predicts that by 2050, it will have lost an additional 22 percent of its current population—second only to Bulgaria—and by 2100, 41 percent. [...]

As bad as those numbers look, the trend looks even worse for Ukraine and Moldova. The UN predicts 36 percent and 51 percent declines in those nations by the end of the century, respectively. Russia, meanwhile, is expected to lose 13 percent by 2100.

Several factors are contributing to the depopulation of Eastern Europe, and Latvia has all of them: low income, compared with more developed EU nations; insufficient growth; and strong anti-immigrant sentiment. The average annual take-home pay among all EU nations was 24,183 euros ($29,834) in 2015, according to Eurostat, while in Latvia it was only 6,814 euros ($8,406).  [...]

Nine out of 10 countries with the lowest acceptance rate of immigrants are former members of the Eastern bloc. Of these, the three Baltic nations had been previously forced to accept Russian-speaking migrants. In Latvia, the issue is so controversial that in 2015, when the EU insisted it accept just a few hundred Syrian refugees, nationalists initially threatened to withdraw from the government. That same year, Latvia came in second to last in the Migrant Integration Policy Index, which ranks 38 democracies according to the quality of immigration policies. Only Turkey did worse. Latvia was fourth from the bottom in Gallup’s 2017 Migrant Acceptance Score list, which ranks countries in order of their populations’ attitudes to immigrants. 

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Quartz: The fastest shrinking countries on earth are in Eastern Europe

The top 10 countries with the fastest shrinking populations are all in Eastern Europe (with a few in Central and Northern Europe), according to UN projections. Bulgaria, Latvia, Moldova, Ukraine, Croatia, Lithuania, Romania, Serbia, Poland, Hungary, are estimated to see their population shrink by 15% or more by 2050.

In Bulgaria, the world’s fastest shrinking country, the population is expected to drop from 7 million in 2017 to 5.4 million in 2050. In Latvia, the population is estimated to drop from 1.9 million in 2017 to 1.5 million, whilst in Moldova, the population is estimated to shrink from 4 million to 3.2 million. [...]

At least 11 countries have shrunk by more than 10% in terms of their population size since 1989, Sobotka says, including, Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine. Latvia lost over a quarter of its population (27%), Lithuania 23%, Bulgaria and Bosnia and Herzegovina 21%. For instance, Bulgarian population contracted from 9 million in 1989 to 7.1 million in 2017. “That’s a massive population loss, unprecedented in peace times,” he explains.

Sobotka puts this population loss down to three factors—falling fertility rates, massive out-migration and relatively high mortality. “So whereas Western and southern European countries have attracted a lot of immigration which largely offset the effects of low fertility, the East is in a double bind, experiencing both out-migration and low birth rates,” he says.

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Political Critique: The Transnistrian challenge: why tensions are escalating between Russia and Moldova

The situation also has relevance for Ukraine. From the perspective of the pro-Western government in Kyiv, Transnistria, as a Russian military stronghold, poses a threat to Ukrainian national security. Ukraine fears that Russia may try to use the Transnistrian territory to destabilise the security situation in the Odessa Oblast, where there is a significant concentration of Russian-speakers. Kyiv has therefore aimed to isolate Transnistria, weaken it economically and politically, and undermine the Russian political and military presence in the region. This strategy has been undertaken in cooperation with Moldova’s pro-Western government. For example, Ukraine and Moldova have established mutual control of the border between Transnistria and Ukraine, allowing Moldovan officials to also control the movement of people and supplies into Transnistria through the Ukrainian border.

From the Moldovan perspective, Transnistria is not just a separatist region, but also a security and political challenge for the country’s pro-Western government. The Moldovan Parliament and government are currently controlled by a pro-Western coalition. However, in the presidential election in November 2016, the pro-Russian candidate Igor Dodon emerged victorious, defeating the pro-Western candidate, Maia Sandu from the Action and Solidarity Party (a newly founded, centre-right and pro-Western party), by a narrow margin. [...]

However, the relative popularity of a pro-Russian candidate should not have come as a surprise. It reflected disappointment with the ruling elite following poor implementation of reforms and a variety of corruption scandals, rather than a belief in the ability of Russia to offer an alternative model for economic or socio-political development. Russia itself is experiencing economic stagnation due to its ineffective, energy oriented economy, as well as Western sanctions. It is unable to implement the necessary reforms which would create the conditions for economic modernisation and improvement of the socio-economic conditions in Russia, far less in Moldova. [...]

The key question is how long Russia will continue to support Transnistria, and to what extent. After the seizure of Crimea, the strategic importance of Transnistria has decreased. Moreover, the de-facto blockade of Transnistria by Moldova and Ukraine makes the Russian presence in Transnistria more complicated and expensive. This is especially the case given Russia’s current economic stagnation: the Russian government has recently been forced to close hospitals around the country and cut subsidies for social programmes. Moreover, Russia is investing significant resources in Crimea, and funding additional military operations abroad.

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openDemocracy: An ideal conflict on the Dniester

On 21 July 1992, the armed conflict in Transnistria came to an end. A Russian peacekeeping mission was introduced to this self-declared republic on the east bank of the Dniester river, internationally recognised as Moldovan territory. After a quarter of a century, Chișinău and Tiraspol still haven’t agreed on a final settlement to the conflict. Nevertheless, both Moldova and breakaway Transnistria often interact with each other as though they were still one state. [...]

Twenty-five years have passed since the end of the war, but Moldova and Transnistria seem no closer to a political settlement to the conflict. Both sides are conducting drawn-out negotiations under the 5+2 format (in which Moldova and Transnistria are recognised the conflicting parties, the OSCE, Russia and Ukraine as mediators, and the EU and US as observers), in which they generally discuss economic and humanitarian issues. So far negotiators haven’t even pressed the key matter: whether Transnistria will be included in a united Moldova. [...]

Moscow prefers not to recognise Tiraspol’s dream of annexation. But negotiations for a settlement to the conflict stand still. Their dynamic can be summed up with one simple fact: since the beginning of this year, not one summit for negotiations in the 5+2 format has been held. Russia and Tiraspol have called for another round of negotiations on several occasions, but Austria, which presides over the OSCE this year, is categorically against. Vienna believes that negotiations should not be held for their own sake, insisting that they must end with concrete agreements. And that’s a result nobody can guarantee. [...]

There are more than 300,000 Moldovan passport holders on the left bank of the Dniester, and this number is constantly rising, given that Moldova entered into a visa-free regime with the EU in 2014. Even Transnistrian public officials take Moldovan citizenship. Transnistrian athletes participate in international competitions under the Moldovan flag, and are members of the national team. Tiraspol’s football club, Sherif, has won the Moldovan league several times over. For landlines and mobile, Transnistria uses the Moldovan international telephone code.

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openDemocracy: Terms and conditions apply: Georgia and Ukraine’s visa-free victory

A political climate hostile to immigration among EU states turned the rather technical procedure of lifting restrictions on short-term visas into a highly politicised ordeal. Concerns over the supposed threat of increased irregular migration and organised crime based largely on anecdotal evidence were used as an excuse by certain EU member states to stall the process and push through a much harsher visa suspension mechanism for all third countries that enjoy visa-free travel to the EU. As part of its strategy of externalising migration controls to third countries, the EU can now swiftly reinstate visa requirements if third countries fail to, for example, accept rejected asylum seekers or effectively prevent the transit of irregular migrants.  [...]

To add insult to injury, Ukrainians in particular were subject to regulations that required them to check-in in person at EU embassies and get their passports stamped upon returning from their trip abroad. Back in 2011, there were multiple reports of consulates forcing Ukrainian citizens to leave behind deposits (in the form of personal documents or money) to ensure they would not overstay their visas. These measures, which were condemned by Ukrainian civil society organisations such as Europe Without Barriers, made obtaining a Schengen visa a thoroughly humiliating, time-consuming and frustrating procedure, particularly for young, independent travellers and those with limited financial means. [...]

In fact, resistance on the part of some of the most influential EU member states such as France, Germany and the Netherlands threatened to sabotage the entire process, sapping the patience of Georgian and Ukrainian officials and weakening public trust in the prospect of imminent visa liberalisation. Unsubstantiated arguments about the dangers of an influx of irregular migration and criminality was used as justification for stalling negotiations in the same way as France, Germany and Netherlands had stalled visa liberalisation for the Western Balkans several years prior on the basis of the high number of asylum claims emanating from the region.

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Politico: Moldovan leader strips ex-Romanian president of citizenship

The new president of Moldova on Tuesday stripped a former Romanian leader of his Moldovan citizenship over calls for the two countries to become one.

Igor Dodon took to Facebook to say that former Romanian President Traian Băsescu had “urged repeatedly the liquidation of Moldovan statehood through annexation to Romania.” He added that Băsescu, who stepped down in 2014 after 10 years in office, refused to recognize the existence of the Moldovan people and Moldovan statehood while he was president of Romania. [...]

Băsescu and his wife became Moldovan citizens in November 2016. He said at the time it was a dream come true as he felt linked to Moldova through a common culture and language, according to Romanian media.

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Politico: The race for EU membership

While national governments would like to ensure political stability in the EU’s neighborhood, they have no appetite to let those countries join before 2025. For some countries, such as Turkey, there’s almost no chance of ever joining. The European Parliament and countries such as Austria are already trying to suspend membership negotiations with Turkey. [...]

Shada Islam, Europe director at Friends of Europe, is pessimistic. “I think we need to stop pretending and accept that there will be no new enlargement for many years — and that all these countries have a long way to go before they meet any of the key membership criteria,” Islam said, adding that given six to 10 years of continuous effort, the six Balkan nations may have a chance at membership. [...]

All other prospective EU members in the Western Balkans suffer fundamental complications. For Macedonia, it’s as simple as Greece refusing to even recognize its name. Allowing Montenegro and Kosovo to join without Serbia alongside them could create a security risk for both countries. Bosnia and Herzegovina is in the worst position of all and may hold these countries back if the EU insists they join in bloc formation. [...]

No country has even turned around a membership application in less than five years (Finland is the current record holder), and for former Warsaw Pact and Yugoslav states, 10-15 years is typical.

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Politico: The new Putin coalition

Vladimir Putin, it used to be said not long ago, had no friends. His invasion of Crimea and meddling in eastern Ukraine made him persona non grata in mainstream Europe and America. Asia saw little value in Russia’s no-growth economy.

These days the Russian leader is on a roll. Without having to backtrack on anything of substance (or territory) in Ukraine, there’s renewed talk of lifting the sanctions imposed in 2014. Putin was always a celebrity, and a source of support, for Europe’s far-right parties, which are themselves on a roll. And now unabashed fans of his in conventional political parties are taking office or rising in the polls.

Soon enough, the West may have its own Putin caucus. Here’s how it’s taking shape:

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Political Critique: Moldova’s new president: his bark is worse than his bite

The Party of Socialists’ Igor Dodon beat challenger Maia Sandu in a runoff vote on Sunday, with 52.3% of the vote to 47.7% for his pro-European rival. Dodon is known for his pro-Russian statements, promising to rule “like Putin”, and declaring that Crimea is Russian territory (with no hint of disapproval).

A cursory look at his campaign literature and his record hits all the pro-Russian talking points — defence of Orthodoxy and “traditional family values”, plus a firm strategic partnership with Russia. His campaign also plays on minorities’ fears of reunion with neighbouring Romania, a marginal but old bugbear in Moldovan politics. [...]

His former colleagues nurtured grudges; the ailing communist party boycotted the election. However, Dodon gained the support of his erstwhile rival Renato Usatii, whose candidate Ciubașcenco took 6% of the vote in the first round. Voting patterns were similar, with the north and south of the country voted strongly for Dodon, and historically pro-Russian autonomous region Gagauzia giving him 99%. The breakaway region of Transnistria played a part, too — over 16,000 Moldovan citizens living there cast votes, the vast majority probably for Dodon.

In its preliminary report, the OSCE has ruled the elections to be largely free and fair, though a polarised media environment and opaque party finances remained a problem. A number of polling stations overseas also ran out of ballots — one of several reasons why Maia Sandu has called on the head of the electoral commission to resign, and has threatened to challenge the result in court.

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