As if Russia’s invasion of Ukraine
were not a sufficient reason for Moldovans to vote in a referendum in 2024 to
align the country’s constitution with accession into the E.U. as a state, which
would entail the government of Moldova giving up some sovereignty, Russia felt
the need nonetheless to buy off votes to hinder Moldova from statehood. That
the pro-statehood vote won, albeit ever so slightly ahead, given the purchased
votes, can be interpreted as an indication that a significant majority of the
half of the eligible voters probably wanted Moldova to accede. That the vote
tally did not reflect this, whether through vote-buying or disinformation, damaged
both Moldova’s accession legitimacy and that of the E.U. itself. Moreover, international law’s lack of enforcement can be
inferred from the sheer scale of Russia’s monetary and political invasion of
Moldova. The importance of enforcement is precisely because bullies tend to
overstep repeatedly rather than just once. They can smell a lack of enforcement
from many miles or kilometers away.
The full essay is at "Russian Vote-Buying in Moldova."
