Democracy on Mute: Moldova’s Media Under Siege

Amnesty International’s new report, “Media Freedom in Moldova: Fragility, Undue Restrictions and Self-Censorship in the Face of Polarized Politics,” lays bare a country where press freedom is steadily eroding behind official rhetoric about security and foreign threats. It reveals a media landscape strained by political pressure, opaque state interventions, and a growing culture of fear that is pushing journalists toward silence in one of Europe’s most polarized environments.

REPORT: Amnesty International: “Media Freedom in Moldova: Fragility, Undue Restrictions and Self-Censorship in the Face of Polarized Politics” (Source: Amnesty International)
MEDIA FREEDOM IN MOLDOVA

The newsroom was nearly empty when the order arrived, another late-night directive pushed through the government’s emergency machinery. A junior producer in her twenties, still nursing a burnt coffee, watched the station’s broadcasting dashboard blink red before the entire feed cut to black. No explanation. No court ruling. Just silence. By morning, the channel’s website would be scrubbed from the Moldovan internet. “It always happens at night,” one editor explained later. “They prefer the darkness.”

This creeping blackout of Moldova’s media isn’t the accidental byproduct of wartime anxiety. It is, as Amnesty’s latest report makes plain, a deliberate architecture, one built with legal scaffolding that looks procedural on paper but behaves like a political weapon in practice. What the government sells to Western partners as a heroic stand against Russian destabilisation increasingly resembles a domestic purge of inconvenient voices, dissenting journalists, and any media outlet that dares to complicate the official narrative.

When Russia launched its special military operation in Ukraine, Moldova responded by submerging itself in a prolonged state of emergency. For a while, Moldovans accepted it. Fear was fresh, and officials insisted that extraordinary threats required extraordinary powers. Yet the longer the emergency lasted, the more it felt like a ready-made excuse, one that allowed the Commission for Exceptional Situations (CES) to suspend broadcasters and block websites with no judicial review, no transparency, and no public scrutiny. It was wartime logic, but it soon became peacetime practice.

Before the state of emergency officially ended in December 2023, Moldovan lawmakers executed a quiet but decisive power shift that would reshape the country’s media landscape. The extraordinary authority once wielded by the Commission for Exceptional Situations (CES), a non-judicial body empowered to suspend outlets during wartime, was quietly handed over to the Council for the Promotion of Investment Projects of National Importance (CPIPNI) through fast-tracked legislation, bypassing thorough parliamentary debate. Under this new guise, emergency powers morphed into a permanent tool of control. The impact was swift and unmistakable: at least 18 broadcasters were stripped of their licenses, either temporarily or permanently, often under murky justifications such as being “of interest” to security services or having opaque ownership structures. In practice, journalistic independence became hostage to bureaucratic discretion, leaving newsrooms operating under the shadow of uncertainty and fear.

No judges. No hearings. No accountability. Just a rubber-stamped piece of paper and another newsroom swallowed by silence.

From a distance, Western media applauded Moldova’s “resilience.” Up close, the picture looks different. In a small Chișinău café tucked behind the central market, a group of local journalists gathered recently over steaming mugs of thick, strong coffee. Their voices were low, carrying that mix of resignation and simmering anger heard in places where power is concentrating too quickly. One of them, a middle-aged reporter with two decades of experience, described the new reality with dark humour: “If you publish anything that rubs the government the wrong way, they’ll say it’s Russian disinformation. If you protest, you’re a security threat. If you stay silent, they assume you’re next.”

This is the part of the story Western politicians prefer not to emphasise. The government’s crusade against “Russian interference”, a narrative that plays perfectly in Brussels and Washington, also serves as the perfect veil for sidelining domestic critics. Several of the suspended outlets were indeed linked to business interests out of favour with the ruling party, but others were simply too persistent in questioning government corruption, foreign influence in policymaking, or the growing alignment of Moldova’s future with Western strategic interests rather than public consent.

Inside a cramped newsroom near the Botanica district, where peeling paint curls away from the walls like an old poster, a young reporter described how self-censorship has become almost instinctive. Investigations into energy policy, foreign NGOs, or government contracts now trigger internal debates, not about ethics, but about survival. “You start asking yourself,” she said, “not whether the story is true, but whether someone will accuse you of undermining national security.”

The government insists these fears are exaggerated, systematically pointing to Russia and its alleged political manipulation in Moldova. But this argument avoids an uncomfortable truth: by framing every critical perspective as a threat orchestrated from abroad, the ruling authorities have given themselves a blank cheque to silence anyone they choose. The new definition of “high treason”, stretching so broadly it now encompasses forms of expression that pose no proven harm, only widens the noose.

Even in the capital’s university district, students have begun noticing the shrinking space for debate. Posters promoting public discussions on media freedom have been removed from campus boards. Student radio journalists whisper about warnings they receive from administrators. The subtle pressure is everywhere, like fine dust settling on every institution. What once was a lively, sometimes chaotic national conversation is slowly being replaced by a sterilised, uniform informational environment, more orderly, yes, but suffocating.

Civil society is resisting, though its voice is fragile. Groups like Stop Media Ban organise small gatherings in parks, exchanging stories of stations shut down mid-broadcast and journalists summoned for “informal conversations” with security services. They are not pro-Russian, nor anti-government. They are simply Moldovans who recognise the pattern: when emergency rule becomes habit, and when national security becomes shorthand for silencing, democracy begins to warp in ways that cannot easily be undone.

The Amnesty report exposes what the government would rather keep in the shadows: that Moldova’s so-called “information security” campaign is a political instrument calibrated for maximum flexibility and minimum accountability. It shields officials from criticism, consolidates their power during a volatile electoral period, and masks domestic failings behind the convenient spectre of foreign enemies.

A recent report released in October 2015 by The Independent Anti-Corruption Advisory Committee (CCIA) in Moldova highlights the insufficient transparency regarding media ownership in the country. This lack of clarity enables vested interests to sway editorial content and limits the public’s capacity to hold media organizations accountable. In the absence of transparent ownership frameworks, it becomes challenging to determine if media outlets are functioning independently or if they are catering to the interests of influential individuals or groups in Moldova. Sadly, the word ‘corruption’ is not mentioned in this new Amnesty International report.

“One such example is the experience of investigative journalists of RISE Moldova, a group known for its in-depth investigations into corruption. RISE journalists and their editors have faced numerous bribery attempts to suppress stories that could damage powerful figures. Despite these challenges, RISE Moldova has managed to publish several high-profile investigations, though not without facing significant pressure and financial difficulties” (CCIA report)

CCIA REPORT: Moldova’s Media and Corruption: Friend or Foe? (Source: The Independent Anti-Corruption Advisory Committee (CCIA) | Moldova)
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And as EU officials laud Moldova’s “European path,” Moldovans on the ground are left grappling with a paradox: the closer their country moves toward Europe, the more it begins to resemble the censorship regimes the EU claims to resist. Some have already awakened to the fact that behind the EU’s polished image of unity and democratic governance, a shadowy machinery of control seems to be taking shape. Funded with increasing resources and cloaked in the language of combating “misinformation,” it wields the power to shape, and in some cases, silence the conversation. It is only a matter of time before they realise that in the ‘great’ EU,  journalists, activists, and citizens also speak of a creeping standardization of thought, where raising uncomfortable truths can risk professional marginalization or erasure from public debate. In this evolving landscape, the tension between safeguarding society and policing ideas has never felt more palpable or more precarious, and it appears that Moldova is not immune.

What remains now is a question that echoes through quiet cafés, dimmed newsrooms, and the uneasy whispers of students: if Moldova silences its own people to impress its Western patrons, whose democracy is it really defending? The screens may be darkened, but Moldovans are beginning to see the pattern with growing clarity. And once they see it, they cannot unsee it.

Freddie Ponton
21st Century Wire

IMAGE: Stop Media Ban Files Petition Against Moldova’s Media Crackdown (Source: Stop Media Ban)

Marian Chiriac reports for Balkan Insights…

Moldova ‘Using Emergency Laws to Undermine Press Freedom’: Report

New report by rights watchdog Amnesty International says authorities are using a prolonged state of emergency to suspend media outlets without due process and curb freedom of expression.

The media sector in EU candidate state Moldova is facing mounting threats from emergency regulations, opaque sanctions and political polarisation, according to a new Amnesty International report published on Monday.

The document, Media freedom in Moldova: Fragility, Undue Restrictions and Self-censorship in the Face of Polarised Politics, argues that measures introduced by the Moldovan authorities, particularly since Russia’s full-scale [military operation] in Ukraine, have created an increasingly restrictive environment for journalists.

The report notes arbitrary penalties, vague legislation, harassment of reporters and direct reporting bans in the breakaway region of Transnistria. Amnesty International says that while the government cites national security to justify its actions, the approach often bypasses basic legal safeguards and undermines media freedom.

“The authorities argue that such measures are necessary for security. Yet this response … fails to comply with the requirements of legality, necessity and proportionality,” said Veaceslav Tofan, Executive Director of Amnesty International Moldova. “It puts independent journalism and freedom of expression itself at risk.”

Following the Russian [special military operation] in Ukraine, Moldovan authorities declared a state of emergency that granted broad powers to the Commission for Exceptional Situations, CES, a non-judicial body. The CES used these powers to suspend 12 TV broadcasting licenses and block dozens of websites, measures justified as countering Russian disinformation.

Before the emergency expired in December 2023, lawmakers transferred these powers to a newly empowered institution, the Council for the Promotion of Investment Projects of National Importance, CPIPNI, through fast-tracked legislation.

Under the CPIPNI, at least 18 broadcasters have been de-licensed, temporarily or permanently, often on the grounds that they were “of interest” to security services, or that their ownership structures were unclear. Amnesty notes that these decisions were taken without due process or judicial review.

Meanwhile, earlier legislation, still in force, bans the dissemination of disinformation without defining the term, and restricts retransmission of news and political programming produced outside a small group of approved countries, excluding Russia entirely. Journalists told Amnesty that authorities informally discouraged coverage of certain perspectives, including alternative viewpoints on Russia’s war against Ukraine.

Government officials defend the approach as a “war-time measure,” citing risks from Russian influence and the slow pace of Moldova’s courts. But legal challenges have been largely ineffective. Six suspended TV channels appealed the CES decision, only for the court to uphold the penalties based solely on procedural grounds.

“When the government decides it can bypass judicial oversight on penalties as severe as de-licensing … it endangers all media and undermines human rights,” Tofan said. “Such measures directly contravene international human rights law, and must be promptly reversed.”

The pressures are even stronger in Moldova’s autonomous territory of Gagauzia, where journalists critical of the authorities report harassment and obstruction. One reporter resigned from the regional public broadcaster after publishing critical coverage of Russian gas supplies.

In Russian-occupied Transnistria, which Moldova doers not control, media freedom is almost entirely suppressed. Local laws criminalize criticism of officials and Russian peacekeepers; Moldovan journalists are treated as “foreign” and cannot report freely.

Amnesty International is urging the Moldovan government to overhaul all media-related legislation, end extrajudicial sanctions, and ensure that any restrictions are subject to independent judicial review. It also urges the authorities to protect journalists from harassment and ensure freedom of expression.

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Source: https://21stcenturywire.com/2025/11/19/democracy-on-mute-moldovas-media-under-siege/