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| {{Short description|Company in Transnistria}} | |||
| ] | |||
| {{Use dmy dates|date=February 2021}} | |||
| '''Sheriff''' (in ]: '''Шериф''') is the second-largest company based in ]. It owns a chain of petrol stations, a chain of supermarkets, a TV channel, a publishing house, a construction company, a Mercedes-Benz dealer, an advertising agency, a spirits factory, two bread factories, a mobile phone network, the football club ] and its newly built stadium and sport complex, at an estimated cost of $200 million <ref>http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2006Oct03/0,4670,PostSovietLimbo,00.html Ex-Soviet Region Feeling More Isolated</ref> including a five-star hotel (the latter still under construction). The name came from the two founders of the company, Viktor Gushan (citizen of ] and Transnistria) and Ilya Kazmaly (citizen of ] and Transnistria), who were previously ] police officers. Viktor Gushan is president and CEO of the company. | |||
| {{Infobox company | |||
| ==Introduction== | |||
| | name = Sheriff | |||
| The majority of ] is ethnically ] but the inhabitants of ] are mostly ], with some ]. Fearing that they would be united with ], the Transdniestr ethnic Russians protested and this sparked the brief but extremely vicious civil war. Although Transdniestr is very tiny, it managed to "win" that civil war and declared itself the "Transdniestr Republic" (] in Russian). I should add that Transdniestr managed to "win" that war because the Russians had enormous amounts of military equipment stationed there, which they permitted the Transdniestrians to use. | |||
| | native_name = Шериф | |||
| | native_name_lang = ru | |||
| | logo = Sheriff logo.png | |||
| | logo_size = | |||
| | type = ] | |||
| | industry = Various | |||
| | founded = {{Start date and age|1993|6|24|df=y}} | |||
| | founders = ] | |||
| | defunct = | |||
| | hq_location_city = ] | |||
| | hq_location_country = ] | |||
| | area_served = ] | |||
| | key_people = {{hlist|Viktor Gushan|Dmitry Ogirchuk}} | |||
| | products = | |||
| | owner = ] | |||
| | num_employees = 13,157<ref>{{cite web |title=Экономическая результативность |url=http://sheriff.md/company/econom/ |website=sheriff.md |access-date=3 October 2018 |archive-date=30 September 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180930221504/http://www.sheriff.md/company/econom |url-status=live }}</ref> | |||
| | num_employees_year = 2012 | |||
| | parent = | |||
| | website = {{URL|http://sheriff.md/}} | |||
| }} | |||
| '''Sheriff''' ({{langx|ru|Шериф}}) is the second-largest company in the unrecognised breakaway state ], behind ]. Based in the city of ], it was formed in the early 1990s by ] and Ilya Kazmaly, former members of the ]. Sheriff has grown to include nearly all forms of profitable private business in the unrecognised country, and has even become significantly involved in local politics and sport,<ref name="helsinki">{{Cite web|date=January 2006|title=Transnistria 2006: Is Regime Change Underway?|url=http://www.bhhrg.org/CountryReport.asp?ChapterID=807&CountryID=16&ReportID=260&keyword=|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070927213008/http://www.bhhrg.org/CountryReport.asp?ChapterID=807&CountryID=16&ReportID=260&keyword=|archive-date=27 September 2007|website=BHHRG online|publisher=British Helsinki Human Rights Group}}</ref> with some commentators saying that company loyalists hold most main government positions in the territory. Anatoly Dirun, director of the Tiraspol School of Political Studies, stated that "Viktor Gushan is the person with the most influence here, both in politics and economics."<ref>{{Cite web|date=2021-10-11|title=Crypto and Caviar: The Empire behind Footballing Giant Slayer 'Sheriff'|url=https://balkaninsight.com/2021/10/11/crypto-and-caviar-the-empire-behind-footballing-giant-slayer-sheriff/|access-date=2021-12-13|website=Balkan Insight|language=en-US|archive-date=13 December 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211213202134/https://balkaninsight.com/2021/10/11/crypto-and-caviar-the-empire-behind-footballing-giant-slayer-sheriff/|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name=":0">{{Cite web|first=Evan|last=Gershkovich|date=2021-09-27|title=In Separatist Transnistria, Sheriff Calls the Shots|url=https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2021/09/27/in-separatist-transnistria-sheriff-calls-the-shots-a75149|access-date=2021-12-13|via=The Moscow Times|publisher=AFP|language=en|archive-date=13 December 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211213202305/https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2021/09/27/in-separatist-transnistria-sheriff-calls-the-shots-a75149|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
| ==Company== | |||
| While no nation officially recognizes the "]" (TDR) as an independent country, for all intents and purposes, it is one. And while it has no land border with Russia, it could not survive without Russia. Russia still maintains a military base in Tiraspol (the "capital" of TDR) and Russia is its largest trading partner, importing goods stamped "Made in TDR". The TDR has its own media (including in English, although delayed), its own "government", its own elections, its own militia, its own customs agents, everything. It is a harshly government "country", run by a man named ], who uses a company called "]" to create a mafia monopoly on all the important aspects of industry. | |||
| ]]] | |||
| ]]] | |||
| Sheriff owns a chain of ]s, a chain of ]s, a ], a ], a ] company, a ] dealer, an ], a ], two ] factories, a ] network, the football club ] and its home ground ], a project which also included a ].<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://pridnestrovie.net/sports.html |title=Sports in Pridnestrovie: Going for Gold |access-date=22 October 2006 |archive-date=24 October 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101024024341/http://www.pridnestrovie.net/sports.html |url-status=dead }}</ref> | |||
| ==Political dealings and corruption== | |||
| More than half the manufacturing and heavy industry in Moldova is inside the TDR, and as a result the non-TDR part of Moldova is largely agricultural, rural and exceedingly poor. Over half of the ethnic Moldovans work outside the country and it is one of the most destitute places in Europe. | |||
| Due to Transnistrian government policies that have isolated the region from the rest of Moldova, Sheriff holds a monopoly in multiple industries in the unrecognized state.<ref name="kommersant">Solovyev, V. & Zygar M. (19 September 2006). {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110606071224/http://www.kommersant.com/p705753/r_1/The_Old_Guard_Wins_in_Transdniestria/ |date=6 June 2011 }} {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061102084859/http://www.kommersant.com/ |date=2 November 2006 }}. Retrieved 2006-11-08.</ref> In the early years, this has also led to ] between the government of ] and Sheriff.<ref name="kommersant" /> Where the company would support Transnistrian government policy and in return, the customs service, which was headed by the president's son, ], gave Sheriff an unfair reduction on taxes and import duties and is also said to be a major silent partner among the leadership of the company.<ref name="kommersant" /> Some media sources have also claimed that Oleg Smirnov, who was another son of Igor Smirnov, was a part of top leadership of Sheriff company, though these claims have never been directly proven and following after 2006 the leadership of Sheriff have publicly opposed Smirnov's politics. Mysteriously following the ] which Igor ended up losing, allegations of Smirnov's clan involvement in Sheriff disappeared from articles about Transnistria.<ref name="sanfran">McCracken, Patti (12 February 2006). {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110524223440/http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=%2Fchronicle%2Farchive%2F2006%2F02%2F12%2FINGHIH5RKS1.DTL |date=24 May 2011 }} {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141024235659/http://www.sfgate.com/ |date=24 October 2014 }} Retrieved 2006-11-17.</ref><ref name="washtimes">Jahn, George (18 January 2004). {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070322023025/http://www.washtimes.com/world/20040118-103519-5374r.htm |date=22 March 2007 }} {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090830144324/http://www.washtimes.com/ |date=30 August 2009 }} Retrieved 2006-11-17.</ref> | |||
| Over the years, Transnistria's indeterminate status has slowed the growth of Sheriff.<ref name="kommersant" /><ref name="moldova"> {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070311022124/http://www.moldova.org/download/eng/529/ |date=11 March 2007 }} ]. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160520103226/http://www.crisisgroup.org/~/media/Files/europe/central-asia/233-water-pressures-in-central-asia.pdf |date=20 May 2016 }} Retrieved 8 November 2006.</ref> When a new party, ], was formed in 2000 which had the goal of Transnistrian independence from Moldova and also supported big business interests, Sheriff supported them,<ref name="helsinki" /><ref name="kommersant" /><ref name="protsyk">Protsyk, Oleh. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070927091937/http://www.policy.hu/protsyk/Publications/ProtsykMolDilemmainTransnistriaApril06.pdf |date=27 September 2007 }} ]. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081015004503/http://www.policy.hu/ |date=15 October 2008 }} Retrieved 8 November 2006.</ref><ref name="renewal"> {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160501193736/http://www.pridnestrovie.net/renewal.html |date=1 May 2016 }} {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100722091035/http://www.pridnestrovie.net/ |date=22 July 2010 }} Retrieved 8 November 2006.</ref><ref name="adept">Botan, Igor (17 January 2006). {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060222154322/http://www.e-democracy.md/en/comments/political/200601171/ |date=22 February 2006 }} {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061120150851/http://www.e-democracy.md/ |date=20 November 2006 }} Retrieved 2006-11-16.</ref> and Sheriff co-founder IIya Kazmaly, as well as the company's Human Resources Director, ], were elected to serve in Transnistrian parliament as members of Renewal.<ref name="vspmr">{{Cite web|url=http://www.vspmr.org/|title=Официальный сайт Верховного Совета Приднестровской Молдавской Республики|website=www.vspmr.org|access-date=1 November 2006|archive-date=23 May 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110523230357/http://www.vspmr.org/|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
| ==Russian-backed Sheriff mafia/company== | |||
| The TDR is a run by the Russian-backed Sheriff mafia/company, and it has no ethics or moral hang-ups. It is a known nexus for drug trafficking, human trafficking and - in terms of world security, far more dangerous - weapons trafficking. The TDR has sold off an unknown number of Soviet-era weapons systems, including missiles. The TDR also manufactures small arms, which are sold off undetected to fuel wars around the planet. Before the Ukraine changed governments at the end of 2004, the TDR also worked with black marketeers in Ukraine to ship out weapon systems via the ] port at ]. This year alone it was discovered that the ] gov't of Ukraine sold ballistic missiles to such countries as ] and ]. | |||
| Sheriff has used its economic clout to sway elections in Transnistria, by virtue of their ownership of the country's mobile/landline phone network and of ], a local television station.<ref name="helsinki" /> In the 2005 parliamentary elections, the Sheriff-supported Renewal party gained an absolute majority in Transnistrian parliament, winning 23 of 43 seats.<ref name="moldova" /><ref name="renewal" /><ref name="adept" /> This victory ousted the long-time Speaker of Parliament Grigori Maracutsa, who was replaced with Renewal leader Evgeny Shevchuk, who also had strong ties to Sheriff.<ref name="moldova" /><ref name="renewal" /> | |||
| There are even reports that as many as 24 missiles stockpiled in TDR before the break-up of the Soviet Union had nuclear warheads. If so, those warheads are now missing and unaccounted for and nobody knows who might have gotten their hands on them. The mafia running TDR has no scruples and would sell them to the highest bidder. | |||
| Following this electoral win, the government of president Smirnov later accused Shevchuk and Sheriff of plotting a coup d'état in Transnistria,<ref name="kommersant" /> claiming that Sheriff was plotting to reintegrate Transnistria with Moldova, in return for profitable business conditions for the company there.<ref name="kommersant" /> The claims were later denied by Sheriff, which maintained that they also desire independence from Moldova.<ref name="kommersant" /><ref name="adept" /> Following multiple attacks between the two parties, Smirnov ended received the support of the Russian government against Sheriff,<ref name="kommersant" /> and Shevchuk disappeared almost entirely from the media despite being the president of Transnistria, and did not register to be a candidate in the ].<ref name="kommersant" /><ref> {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070927005658/http://conflict.md/stiri.php?ID=1792 |date=27 September 2007 }}, Retrieved 13 November 2006.</ref> However, in the ], Shevchuk beat both Igor Smirnov and Renewal's new leader ] to become president. On 29 December 2012, ] issued a decree abolishing all preferences previously granted to Sheriff by Igor Smirnov and ended the period of the company's unfair market position in Transnistria's economy.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.osw.waw.pl/en/publikacje/osw-commentary/2013-05-16/aided-economy-characteristics-transnistrian-economic-model|title=An aided economy. The characteristics of the Transnistrian economic model|date=16 May 2013|website=OSW Centre for Eastern Studies|access-date=20 March 2021|archive-date=17 April 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210417105116/https://www.osw.waw.pl/en/publikacje/osw-commentary/2013-05-16/aided-economy-characteristics-transnistrian-economic-model|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://profvesti.org/2013/02/16/10065/|title=Нас ждут «голые» полки магазинов? Профсоюзные Вести, 16 February 2013.|access-date=11 July 2013|archive-date=4 March 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304050242/http://profvesti.org/2013/02/16/10065/|url-status=dead}}</ref> | |||
| ==Pridnestrovskaya Moldavskaya Respublika – Terra Incognita== | |||
| The ] is a black hole where anything goes and while Moldova, the ] (and now ]) have put pressure on the TDR to unite with Moldova, even offering it autonomy, it has steadfastly refused. And it can do this precisely because of the Russian military presence and backing of its "government". | |||
| In 2015, it was alleged that roughly one third of all the money from the Transnistrian budget was paid out to companies owned by Sheriff.<ref name=":0" /> | |||
| In essence, it is this tiny corner of Europe, mostly unknown and forgotten by the rest of the world, that is the major hold-up for the ratification of one of the most important treaties of our time. It is the activities in this small slice of Europe that pose one of the gravest dangers to peace and stability on the continent, and yet it's mostly forgotten and ignored. | |||
| ==Notes and references== | |||
| Trans-Dniester, about twice the size of Luxembourg and comprising one-eighth of Moldova, has never stopped yearning for Russia's embrace. Its leader, Igor Smirnov, who has Russian citizenship, hails Russia as the natural home for his people. | |||
| {{Reflist}} | |||
| ==External links== | |||
| Trans-Dniester declared itself independent as the Soviet Union began to show signs of crumbling, fearing Moldova would seek to reunite with Romania. Pro-Western Moldova, backed by the European Union, wants it back. The Kremlin, while at odds with Moldova and sympathetic to the separatists, has reacted coolly to the idea of absorbing the impoverished territory, and says the two sides should negotiate a settlement. | |||
| * {{Commons category-inline}} | |||
| * {{Official website|http://www.sheriff.md }} | |||
| {{Authority control}} | |||
| So the Sept. 17 referendum, which voted 97.1 percent yes to the government's goal of union with Russia, is dismissed by political analyst Viorel Cibotaru of Moldova's Institute of Public Policy as a feel-good measure and nothing more. | |||
| "It's like a circus: you see something, but it's an illusion. Because the truth is, Trans-Dniester is an empty idea, it's going nowhere,"he says. | |||
| Not so, insists Smirnov. Trans-Dniester and Moldova simply have nothing in common, the president declared to his people after the vote."We choose Russia, and they choose the European Union and NATO. All these 16 years, they have tried to impose on us an alien point of view ... but today, that's history." | |||
| History weighs heavy here. Once known as Bessarabia, the entire region has a rich ethnic mix, with parts of it falling under the Lithuanian, Czarist Russian, Romanian and Soviet empires. Today, the scrambled geopolitical jigsaw puzzle left by the Soviet collapse is highlighted by the 109-year-old Kvint distillery in Trans-Dniester's capital, Tiraspol. Caught on a bureaucratic merry-go-round, its wines and cognacs are frozen out of Russia because the Kremlin considers them Moldovan, and has an embargo on Moldovan alcohol. And they were frozen out of Ukraine for two years because they weren't considered Moldovan enough _ the plant didn't have the right Moldovan business registration. Its export certificate is still only temporary. | |||
| Critics claim Trans-Dniester is a paradise for smugglers, bandits and traffickers in weapons and drugs."The Trans-Dniester problem is reflecting negatively on the entire criminal situation in Moldova and Ukraine,"Ukraine's interior minister, Yuriy Lutsenko, complained recently. | |||
| The EU has deployed border police of its member states to help stem the flow of contraband through the deserted, hilly roads that connect Trans-Dniester to Ukraine. | |||
| Trans-Dniester has responded to criticism with a charm offensive on the Web.http://www.pridnestrovie.netoffers"10 things you didn't know about Europe's newest country,"including that it has twice the population of Iceland, 35 national groups and a market economy. It also claims to have made giant inroads into the smuggling problem, and quotes EU and other Western watchdogs as saying"there is no evidence that Pridnestrovie (Trans-Dniester) has ever trafficked arms or nuclear material." | |||
| That's a reference to reports that circulated in 2004 claiming Trans-Dniester could be a marketplace for weapons of mass destruction left over from when the Soviets had arms factories here. | |||
| ===Reservoir Dogs === | |||
| The year: 2005. A small pre-documentation in Geneva among the most important international agencies for weapons traffic monitoring. The subject: Transnistria – manufacturing and traffic of weapons. The usual answer we get from experts is “how do you spell the name of that country?” For the most of them, the Transnistrian republic is on the map in that place with lions, an unknown and mysterious place, where Mister Black is acting up. Everyone living in that part of the world is Mister Black – the model for the weapons trafficker, for the smuggler, and for the raket. For those who know something, Transnistria is Europe’s black hole. And that’s it. The articles to follow we’ll shed some light on some details about this last Sovietic republic, only 170 kilometers away from Romania and the future Eastern border of the European Union. We’ve looked into finding out who is maintaining the present “situation” in PMR, who is financially benefiting out of it, and to detail on the production and traffic of weapons. Nonetheless, we wanted to find out who was affected by what ever was happening there. What you are going to read is a journalistic investigation on the only “theoretically inexistent” country in Europe. | |||
| We have begun our investigation on Transnistria in Vaduz, Liechtenstein. We wanted to find out who was behind the companies EIM Consulting and Rumney Trust, which had taken over one of the strategic industrial objectives in PMR. The metallurgic unit from Rabnita (MMZ), an industrial mammoth with 4,000 employees, accused many times of manufacturing weapons and of money laundry in Western countries. Besides clarifying the shareholders structure behind the unknown companies which own MMZ, we have also started to riddle out the economical interests that keep working the few strategic objectives, as well as the separatist republic. In Vaduz we discovered the name of the 5 persons who own EIM Consulting and Rumney Trust. They are obviously cover persons. This is how the journalistic investigation on Transnistria has begun. The project lasted for 6 months and it involved journalists from Romania, Moldova, Ukraine, and Russia. The project also meant a two weeks undercover trip in the separatist republic and in the region. At the end of the investigation, behind the cover Vaduz company, we have found connections to several groups of businessmen from the Ukraine and Russia, groups also having connections to organized crime and Sovietic secret service. We tried to back up with documents all connections with other important economical objectives and with the local political elite, all hidden by some cover companies from Switzerland, Cyprus and other fiscal paradises. We discovered that the groups to be mentioned on were interconnected and basically controlled everything in the area, and no business, legal or illicit, was developed without them knowing about it or being part of it. It is a complex criminal group which made its own country. Moreover, this country has at its disposal dozens of tons of Sovietic weapons, several weapon production units, and tens of thousands of men in military and paramilitary structures. According to former Transnistrian politicians, one man out of five owns weapons illegally in that area. The different actors fight one another and make justice on their own from time to time. Then victims come up. They are homicide cases with unknown perpetrators, because international authorities have no access in Transnistria. | |||
| ===Meet Mr. Black ! === | |||
| While traveling through the little kingdom of Liechtenstein, one can’t help but noticing resemblances between this rich paradise of unknown companies and the separatist republic. Even if one considers only the very obvious differences between the two countries, there still remains a common point: they are both hope oases, covers for organized crime groups from all countries, but so very different at the same time when it comes to looking after their citizens. A country where luxury is everywhere to see, on one hand, and an extremely poor country on the other hand; a country which doesn’t involve in any wars and a piece of land where the sound and sight of guns are ordinary; a country that makes money for the community, as compared to a farm that makes rich very few of its people. From the quiet little streets of Vaduz, we got into a Sovietic republic frozen in time. The symbols of president Smirnov and Sheriff, controlled by his family, are everywhere, right after you pass the first border customs with Moldova. Luxury is replaced by poverty. Safety and comfort are replaced by permanent anxiety. We arrived to Tiraspol on the pretext of traveling to Odessa. Transnistria is not a region favorable to journalists, as several journalists were arrested or detained by the security because they were there without having any credentials. To get credentials as a journalist, you would have to address a detailed description of your intentions to the local intelligence service – MGB – a direct descendent of KGB. As a foreign journalist, you can get a MGB officer to supervise your work. This is the reason why an official international journalistic investigation in Transnistria can not be taken into consideration. We decided to enter the separatist republic every day, using different access border units and different pretexts, and we were to leave the country every evening. | |||
| === History. === | |||
| On October 12, 1924, on the present day territory of Transnistria, the Soviet Union founded the Socialist Sovietic Republic of Moldova (RASSM). The purpose was to add later on Basarabia to the newly founded country on the left side of the Nistru. The capital of RASSM was Tiraspol. In 1940, the USSR added Basarabia to the republic, and the Sovietic Socialist Republic of Moldova was born. Between 1941 and 1944, Basarabia became part of Romania again. Romania didn’t claim Transnistria and in 1944 all the above mentioned territories were added to the Soviet Union. | |||
| === Conflict. === | |||
| Last military conflict Transnistria went through was in 1992, between March and July. Hundred thousand refugees left the county and hundreds of people allegedly died. Transnistria was logistically supported by the Soviet army while Moldova didn’t yet have an army of its own, using police officers from the Nistru area in the beginning of the conflict. | |||
| === Arms. === | |||
| At the beginning, snipers were the ones making victims, while the separatists used “eccentric” bullets, with modified weight centre and ultra red devices during nighttime. Several types of forbidden ammunition were used, especially several types of antipersonnel landmines. There were also used helicopters, tanks, armored vehicles, missiles, almost everything they could find in the Sovietic military deposits on the left side of Nistru. | |||
| === Area and Population. === | |||
| The area is of 4.136 square kilometers, and the border is of 816 kilometers. In 2004, the population of Transnistria was officially of 550 thousand people. 300 thousand of them are Moldavian citizens and almost 100 thousand of them are Russian citizens. | |||
| ===Budget. === | |||
| The analysts estimate the budget as being around 80 million dollars every year. The domestic gross, according to the Transnistrian officials, is of 280 million dollars. The local currency is the Transnistrian ruble. | |||
| === ]=== | |||
| Transnistria is characterized by the monopolizing business activities. The Sheriff Company controls almost everything has any relevance at all in the business environment. The company is controlled by the family of President Smirnov. Other monopolizing business activity is the one of the telecommunications, through Interdnestrcom which is the only company providing land and mobile telecommunication services, internet included. | |||
| ===Penalties=== | |||
| During the last 15 years of negotiations and futile agreements, the international community has taken only two efficient decisions against Transnistria: the interdiction to travel across Europe and the United States for the Transnistrian diplomats (since 2003) and an interdiction to export Transnistrian goods if the trading company wasn’t registered and the export fees imposed to the goods exported by Moldova (since 2006). | |||
| === Korporatzya === | |||
| Smirnov’s republic, ruled as a real organized crime group, first needs to be protected. Transnistria is well protected. We are talking about the army, paramilitary groups (The Cossack Army and the Popular Army) and the Defense Ministry forces, as well as the MGB troops. If needed, Transnistria relies on 25 thousand people well trained and thoroughly armed. In a life time of peace all this military structure works for keeping a tight hand over a poor population and for protecting the business interests of the elite. Secret service is in all political parties, governmental organizations, large companies, and mass-media. MGB (built on the old KGB structure) has been functioning ever since. The organization changed only the name and went on with the activity of the predecessors, developing it further on. A good example of the MGB activity is Dimitri Soin. He is a high rank officer, coordinator of the department for the Protection of the Constitution since 92. He studied in Moscow and he develops other additional activities. He is a sociologist, a professor with the University of Tiraspol, a yoga instructor, business man and founder of non-governmental organizations that support themselves financially. Soin is going to open a postmodern yoga centre in Tiraspol, he owns a rehabilitation clinic and he is the mentor of a radical youth organization, Proriv. We shall talk about his involvement in criminal activities in further articles. Soin is just one of the MGB officers. The entire security structure of Transnistria is made up of that kind of people, active in several fields. All this structure is actively involved in the political and social environment, as well as in the media. The adversaries of the regime are either banished either eliminated. | |||
| ===Economic=== | |||
| The entire security system has several stakes. First of all is the protection offered to the groups of interest from Russia and the Ukraine that are all making business in Transnistria. We discovered a few important groups that were running business activities in the separatist republic. We shall enumerate them, details to be provided later on. First place should go to the groups represented by Alisher Usmanov, a Russian oligarch; then there are the business men connected to Semion Mogilevich, the head of Russian mafia, or to Gafur Rachimov and Serghei Michailov; then we have the business joint activities of Peter Poroshenko, the former head of the Ukrainian Security Council and defense secretary of President Yushcenko; then we also have the trusts Dynamo, SMART Group and PRIVAT Group, all controlled by Ukrainian and Russian oligarchs: Anatoli Ciubais (former Vice Prime Minister, finance minister and Prime Minister), Michail Kasianov (former Primer Minister) and Victor Cernomirdin (former Prime Minister), but we have also identified two key companies in the European organized crime groups: Gazprom and RAO EES, the Russian energetic giant. | |||
| ===Arms=== | |||
| Secondly, the stakes of the excessive security is armament: production, stoking and transfer of weapons from Transnistria. During the last 15 years, weapons were the strongest currency in the region. The 14th Army deposits and the production units founded during the time of the Soviet Union provided arms for all military conflicts in the Caucasians, the former Yugoslavia, in some African countries, or in Iraq. This is a huge business enterprise that has to be kept under control and which makes money for all carefully selected arms dealers. | |||
| ===Organized Crime=== | |||
| Such characters and company couldn’t have appeared in the area without being accompanied by all sorts of criminal organization, thus labeled by all investigation agencies in the Western Europe and the United States. The Mogilevich grouping and the Odessa grouping of Angert are only two examples of cells working on the Transnistrian territory. To these we can add diverse business connections with Solntsevo. Weapons trader Victor Bout didn’t stay away from this republic either. It is really interesting that in the area there came up as investors, people connecting the United States with Casa Nostra and similar groups from Israel. To all the above one can also add the very interests of some of the most important Russian bankers. At the beginning of the 90’s, the latter founded some financial colossus in the name of the former Communist Party and with the help of the secret service and of the army. The picture is all clear. The common feature of both the oligarchs and the groups already labeled as “criminal” is first and foremost money laundry. Local authorities from Chisinau accuse Transnistria to have been transformed into a money Laundromat, with a cash flow of 2 billion dollars every year. | |||
| ===Collapse=== | |||
| Even if PMR produces enormous amounts of money, there are only very few who enjoy the profit. The 500 thousand inhabitants of the country experience extreme poverty. Infrastructure is almost inexistent; there is no tourism, while the profit made by local industry goes to local politicians through cover companies. Once you got out of Tiraspol, while traveling across the country, you can see a wasteland, left to decay. An old man from Camenca told us “Our children have no chance. They are learning how to steal or how to waste time.” | |||
| ===Profit for Pacifiers=== | |||
| Transnistria is an income source not only for its insiders. All three outside actors benefit from the separatist republic and its status-quo: Moldova, the Ukraine, and Russia. What is quite extraordinary is the fact that Moldova, Ukraine and Russia, the three countries which fought in 1992, became during the last 15 years the “pacifiers”. They have the mission to end the conflict and to assure peace in the region. We can only conclude that only financial benefits kept them on the peaceful tracks all these years. We have shown before that representatives of groups of interest from Ukraine and Russian are developing business activities in Transnistria. To al the above mentioned, we can add the most important political forces. On the other hand, in Moldova, profit is divided between the politicians succeeding to leadership in all these years. A good example is the one of the border stamps. The Moldavian stamps were stolen by the Transnistrians and the latter used them in all import-export actions. Even if there were means of changing those stamps, they kept being used for almost ten years. They were used especially for smuggling and enormous amounts of money were used to corrupt Moldavian clerks to keep the old stamps. All this shows how profitable is to keep a status quo in Transnistria. | |||
| ===Passivity === | |||
| The only hopes for changing something are the European Union and the United States. Till lately, the latter just observed passively the situation. Most of the times, they both mimed implication, by making negotiations and no purpose agreements, or by kindly asking Russia to leave the republic. Some of the measures adopted by the two, some of them of economic nature, could turn Transnistria into a useless tool for money laundry. The reason is the fact that all these operations are developed through banks from Europe and the USA. What is certain is that neither the Europeans, neither the Americans are aware of the threat represented by Transnistria. This means the problem can still wait for a solution. | |||
| ===In the Future=== | |||
| It is still uncertain how the conflict on the Nistru is to be solved. But it is clear that once the European Union gets nearer to Transnistria, smuggling all sorts of goods would increase. The little traffic will get better organized and more efficient, having as target the Western markets. But if Transnistria became the territory of a recognized country, the larger majority of the local political elite would have to leave the region because of the frauds and, in some cases, murders they committed. | |||
| It is very interesting to observe the Russians’ strategy. Before the European Union expanded, they bought industrial objectives that can become extremely profitable after the EU extension towards the East. Another example could be the Metallurgical Unit from Rabnita. The examples can go on. Soon, everything that worth buying will belong to the Russians. Once the privatization is done, the 14th Army can leave the region because the Russian business men basically control the territory using cover companies. Moreover, in order not the be accused of making business with the Smirnov regime, public Russian companies used middle men, off shore companies, to get hands on such industrial objectives. | |||
| The project "Transdniester - Revealing Europe's black hole" is an investigation of CRJI, financed by SCOOP in Danemark and SAS in Switzerland. The participants in this project are the following journalists: Vitalie Calugareanu (Chisinau), Vlad Lavrov (Kiev), Igor Boldyrev (Odessa), Alexander Bratersky (Moscova) and foto Robert Ghement. | |||
| The Transnistrian socio-political picture is quite strange for a European country. The republic is more like any oh those African countries threaded by wars, where a group of generals rule absolutely. In the Transnistrian case, not all leaders are generals, but most of the “actors” that really count had high ranks in the Russian secret service – KGB or GRU. They founded an oppressive regime organized on the former KGB structure that keeps a strong hand on the political, business, civil and mass-media environment, through a few persons. It is obvious that these persons occupy positions of leaders of control and order groups. At the same time, the life and atmosphere in this republic is the one of the USSR at the peak of its glory. The only really important freedom of the Transnistrians is the fact that they can travel outside the country. For the ones with Transnistrian passport this freedom is limited to the former Sovietic space. The freedom of making business is apparent. All business develops in a semi-legal or completely illegal frame, and all big business relates to the group around the company Sheriff, which is controlled by the family of President Smirnov and by local security agents. | |||
| ===Communism without Communists === | |||
| Communist symbols are to be seen everywhere in the little republic. The sickle and the hammer, the red star – are the symbols on the Transnistrian coat of arms. In any town, on any magazine or newspaper, these symbols are used obsessively. Statues of Lenin and of Stalin, tanks and other symbols of the Sovietic era are to be found everywhere. And still, in all discussions we had with simple people, they didn't leave the impression to consider they are living in a communist country, but that they are living in a kind of capitalism that they all detest. This is the result of the propaganda machine which claims that Transnistria is an important force in the process of eradicating the communism in the region, and especially in the neighborhood – meaning in the Moldavian republic. Moreover, the communist party from Transnistria and its members began being banished at the end of the 90's because of all connections they had with the party of Vladimir Voronin, the president of Moldova . Secret service then confiscated electoral materials of the Transnistrian communist party. In 2002, an opposition movement was declares illegal because it had supported the Moldavian communist party. Basically, ideology isn't that important in Transnistria. Business interest is important. Governmental propaganda promotes a few leaders, like Igor Smirnov and the brave fighters who defended their country arms in hands. All the rest is just a hotchpotch of symbols promoted all at the same time. Besides the communist symbols, the Sheriff's symbols are well honored. Moreover, we discovered in astonishment a real personality cult for Che Guevarra, an idol of president Smirnov in his young days, nowadays representing a right wing extremist movement in Tiraspol . The founder of this organization, PRORIV (The Piercing Ones) is a high rank officer of the Transnistrian secret service (MGB). A more thoroughly look into the organization and its founder - Dmitri Soin – can shed some light on the modality used by the oppressive and propaganda regime used to interact with additional fields: the non-governmental organizations, press, political environment, economic environment and the organized crime world. | |||
| ===The Transnistrian=== | |||
| “Do you really have journalists' credentials?” asks nervously the taxi driver who took us from Chisinau to Tiraspol . He relaxes a bit after our affirmative answer,, especially that when crossing the border he hears us mentioning the name of Dmitri Soin as a passing password. Not only has the driver relaxed, but also all customs officers who let us pass with no comments at all. Two days before we were retained and controlled thoroughly by the border guards, who are under the dreaded MGB authority. | |||
| We decided to visit Soin after having finalized our undercover journalistic investigation on the Transnistrian territory. We were at the end of the two weeks of research, and after having received a warning from the border guards by being retained and thoroughly searched when entering the country at Bender. Soin helped us to enter the country as journalists by telephone: “I will help you with the permit. At the border, just say that you are to meet me. It will be enough.” It was enough indeed. No other supplementary explanation was asked from us. | |||
| From the grey of the Sovietic capital dominated by Lenin, we have entered a Western oasis – the premises of the youth organization Proriv. The organization has 300 permanent members only in Tiraspol and it occupies a wing of the Eilenburg cafe. The restaurant was opened in the honor of the mayor of the East German town of Eilenburg that accepted to fraternize with Tiraspol in 2002. The relation got colder in the last years though. Thus part of the restaurant transformed into the Eilenburg cultural centre and it hosts a right wing extremist organization. We were greeted by bodyguards at the door. They monitor every corner of the building and the surroundings on several monitors. Soin's black BMW series 7 reigns right in front of the building. The MGB officer is smiling when receiving us, he speaks English but the interview will be done in Russian. The premises are large and modernly furnished. Western musical hits can be heard in the up to date stereo system. All Proriv managers are student girls and they all walk around dressed clubbing style. They all wear leather high heels boots, net stockings, and skinny trousers. Ten computers are on one side of the room and all their desktops present a picture of Che Guevarra at several stages of his life. Che also has some sort of a shrine built around the flags of Russia , Transnistria and of Proriv. A few teenage girls are sticking red flower, getting the room ready for the new member acceptance ceremony. This headquarters is the place where people can attend the “High School for Political Leaders – Ernesto Che Guevarra”. | |||
| “We train young people to be able to found their own organization and to make propaganda material. We are into building a post-modern society – we democratize Transnistria and we drive the communists out of Moldova ” declares a smiling security major Soin. “I do work for the secret service as a major and I run the department for the Constitution Defense. But I'm thinking about retiring, I've been working in this department since 1992.” Soin is a character developing a quite diverse activity field: sociologist, sociology professor with the University of Tiraspol , and yoga instructor. He founded a private rehabilitation centre, he owns a publishing company and a construction company and he is to inaugurate a night club and a post modern yoga institute. The gendarme starts playing nervously with his pen when we pull aside the curtains to take a picture of him. Right then, a guard starts patrolling discreetly in front of the window. Soin wears a massive gold watch with a brown leather strap, which matches his leather jacket. He wears long hair, in a pony tail. He is tall, well built, and he wears only designer clothes. His t-shirt reads Roberto Cavalli. A bit later we notice a revolver under his belt. Soin fears being kidnapped. “There were several attempts to kidnap me beginning with 2005. Now I have a strong permanent guarding squad. Three cars in Tiraspol and another two for when leaving town. They are all MGB intervention officers.” When asked about choosing Che Guevarra the symbol of a right wing organization, Soin answers that his organization is neither Stalinist nor right winged. “Che Guevarra is the symbol of the romantic revolution – and that's what we intend to do. Organization wise we are much alike the ones from Pora, the ones responsible for the Orange Revolution in the Ukraine .” | |||
| A weird thing was the fact that when opening the school last year, Soin delivered a speech about the danger represented by the Orange Revolutions in the area. This is also the opinion of his superior, Antiufeev. As for the Proriv being a right wing organization, its very actions label it this way. Moreover, the web sites of Proriv are connected in an international network of extreme right wing, while the greeting shared by all members is identical with the one shared by the Nazis, with the exception that the fist is kept tight when rising the hand. Even if when opening the School Che Guevarra Sorin declared that all attendees had to undergo military training, we met no members older than the teenage. The average age, at least at the ceremony for accepting new members, was of 15 years. | |||
| ===British Financing? === | |||
| Soin doesn't talk too openly about the financing of this organization. He mentions first and foremost the self financing though a fundraising and political consulting department, while Transnistrian companies can't afford to refuse an MGB officer. Then he brings Russia as main financer into discussion. When asked about western financing, Soin says there is not the case for the time being, but he avoids talking about the past. Stef an Uratu from the Moldavian Helsinki Committee says that during a seminary about Transnistria in Brussels , in November 2005, one of the representatives of the British Embassy in Moldova , Margareta Mamaliga, stated that the Embassy was supporting Proriv through its program “ Peace Building ”. Mamaliga denies the information, but refused to show us the list with all NGO's from Transnistria that benefited from this financing. | |||
| Igor Smirnov Soin is also the founder of an NGO, called Strategiya, which us a part of the alliance The Young Patriots - Molodaya Gvardiya. The opponents of the Smirnov regime complain that with the help of these organizations, Soin and implicit the MGB have at their disposal an army made up of young people. This army goes vandal and threatens everyone in Soin's way. The last “accomplishment” of Proriv was (for example) the devastation of the Tiraspol OSCE premises and capturing its flag. “It was just a Fool Day joke, I really can't understand why people took it so seriously” declares Soin. The flag is still at the Proriv headquarters. | |||
| ===”I Should Have Had a Sniper Riffle!” === | |||
| Soin is closely related to organized crime. He is being accused of committing two murders directly, killing a hitchhiker and money lender. Then he is being accused of plotting other 25 murders in the service of MGB and especially to help Antiufeev (the head MGB) dominating the small local organized crime groups. Among the accusers there is also the former commander of the 14 th Army, Michail Bergman. | |||
| Moreover, last year, Soin was involved in a weird weapons smuggling case. A British journalist with Sunday Times, posing as a weapons dealer, got in contact with a MGB officer, in order to purchase some Alazan missiles from Transnistria. The Alazan missiles were meteorological, but they had been turned into combat and marking missiles. According to the documents we have, there used to be 38 such missiles on the Transnistrian territory. | |||
| The MGB officer passed the British journalist to a middle man, Dmitri Soin, of whom the journalist knew nothing and thought to be a member of the underworld. The journalist met Soin several times, first time in Transnistria and then in a hotel in Chisinau. Their negotiations led to a final quote of 500 thousand dollars for three Alazan missiles, with the option of prior inspection. The missiles were to be delivered on an airport in Southern Ukraine . Sunday Times broke the deal and issued an article on the subject. | |||
| Soin denies all accusations. He claims he is the victim of some war on “dirty” information, all set up by the Moldavian secret services. His vocabulary mixes same phrases we heard Antiufeev speaking: the fifth column is being prepared by SIS, they are all Goebbels propaganda techniques, and all people against him are agents. When asked why he is allowed to travel freely, he answered he couldn't go to Moldova , because he would have been arrested. He didn't know whether he was on the Interpol's list and he thought he could travel around other countries. But we have checked that out and Soin is on the Interpol's list, wanted for murder. | |||
| ===Oleg Voronin Outlawry === | |||
| “Hide your money!” kindly warns us the bus driver when getting closer to the Transnistrian border point from Bender. After passing the check point, we understand the reason of his warning us: the border guards are looking into pinching the smallest of gifts, the checking is formal anyways. We have not spotted any Transnistria registered vehicle to be checked. The border point has no surveillance cameras, no special technical endowment and not even computers. Information is being kept in huge books, that no one knows where they are stored. The border guards aren't interested in what is in the cars, they are interested only in the financial potential of the people who want to cross the border. But we have seen on the walls of the most useless border point we have ever been to a calendar made by Sheriff. | |||
| The main actors of the oppression mechanism are the troops of the Ministry of Interior and the ones of the State Security Ministry (MGB). The border guards are directly subordinated to the latter. An important role in keeping under a strict supervising, especially all economic activities, is being handled by the border authorities. The Interior and the Security are directly subordinated to former Sovietic leaders, born away from the Transnistrian republic and wanted for murders in other countries. The customs are being looked after by president Smirnov's two children. They also have Russian passports. | |||
| A former Russian colonel, Iurevici Vladimir Antiufeev, is the one who keeps an iron hand on the domestic security. The dismemberment of the former USSR catches him in Riga , in the service of the OMON Special Forces. He is not ashamed to admit the fact that he came back to Tiraspol while in mission to organize the domestic security service, when the destabilization actions planned by the Riga government failed. He left behind several corpses, and he is wanted by the authorities in Riga for military actions under the command of the Russian Special Forces. | |||
| Vladimir Smirnov is the president of the customs, having the rank of a minister. Oleg Smirnov is his councilor. Vladimir is the oldest son of the president, while Oleg is the youngest. Neither of them was born on Transnistrian territory. They were more than 20 years old when their father was sent from Kamchatka to Tiraspol , in 1997. Besides being a councilor, Oleg Smirnov is also the manager of the most important company in the country, Sheriff. This company has the highest exports incomes, and it is accused by economists from neighboring country of having organized the most profitable smuggling transports. | |||
| From information gathered on field and from all statistics figures with relation to all captures made in Moldova and the Ukraine, it can be seen that the security service and the customs in Transnistria are basically forces to protect, organize and tithing the illicit activities. The structure of the army forces in the republic is also very interesting. Basically, the Transnistrian army as well as the 14 th Army and the Russian peace keeping troops are using Transnistrians. Some of them work based on contracts, while some serve in the army. | |||
| ===Spies are hiding among NGO's === | |||
| Dmitrii Soin Just a month before going to Transnistria, the security minister Antiufeev, declared the region is populated with spies from Moldova , Romania and other Western countries that are preparing the fall of the Tiraspol regime. As an immediate measure any international financing for the NGO's was strictly forbidden. | |||
| The oppressive regime led by MGB doesn't avoid any method to keep the Transnistrians under control. Information sources are few and exclusively politically controlled. There's a poor written press, where the weak voice of the opposition can be barely heard due to lack of money and misdistribution. Then there is the audio-video entirely controlled by the government and the company Sheriff, which is coordinated by MGB agents too. The attacks on possible opponents begin with threatening phone calls and they continue with destroying the premises of any targeted organization or with devastating the leaders' apartments. Physical attacks on leaders follow up, and then it's time for confiscating any promotional material or outlawing the very organization. There are also cases of physical elimination. | |||
| In 1989, agents of the feared MGB confiscated the posters of the communist party announcing that all activities of that party were against the law. The headquarters were vandalized by unknown persons. In short time, the communist party was outlawed. The reason for all those actions was the domestic opposition as well as the connections the communists had with the party of the Moldavian president Vladimir Voronin. | |||
| In 2000, the leader of the Rabnita branch office of the party The Transnistrian Unity, Victor Voevodin, was checked into hospital in critical conditions after having been attacked by unknown persons when entering his apartment. Voevodin was beaten up with craw bars and bricks. The attack took place little time before the elections, and after the then Minister of Information and Communications, Boris Akulov, banned the printing of any promotional materials for the Transnistrian Unity. Authorities even got to tear up all posters posted into Bender and Tiraspol , threatening to outlaw the party. | |||
| In 2002, Oleg Belokamen, the president of the Transnistrian Russians community, was found shot dead near Tiraspol . Belokameni was vice mayor and he had business interests in Rabnita. | |||
| ===Outlawed === | |||
| The weak opposition existing nowadays in Transnistria is killed before being born. At the same time with the communists, another two parties were outlawed at the beginning of 2000. We mean Partia Narodovlastia (The People Power Party) led by Alexander Radcenko and Vlasti Narodu (The Power of the People) led by Nikolay Buceatki. Both parties were outlawed at the request of the security and of the Minister of Justice. The two parties united and formed the Found for the Human Rights. The president of the organization is Radcenko, while Buceatki is the vice president. They were both members of the Transnistrian parliament but they fell into disgrace. During the last two years, both of them were the target of the secret service and of the youth organizations. They were publicly insulted, threatened in any possible way, their homes were vandalized, and acid was poured under their doors. OSCE had to step in so that the attacks slow down. Now all opposition is only under the supervision of the security service. | |||
| ===Home with the Opposition === | |||
| Somewhere near the central boulevard of Tiraspol , near the Supreme Soviet, there is the headquarters of the political entity of the two. We met Alexander Radcenko, who shakes our hands strongly, while he is asking us to hurry up if we don't want to be taken in all together during the interview. The same building is the headquarters for the only opposition newspapers: Novaia Gazeta , Dobrii Deni and Celovek i evo prava (The Man and His Rights) – newspapers edited by Radcenko and Buceatki. There are a few little rooms, in a shattered building in the backyard full of garbage. The entrance is a door sustaining itself in a single joint. “Look, they broke our windows and they set on fire the doors. They constantly threaten our families, they tap our phones. All this building is bugged” The newspapers issue few copies, but they are the only newspapers we could find there against Smirnov. Interestingly enough, the newspapers don't issue any extra information from the inside, related to the activity of the Smirnov regime, they just circulate details already issued in Moldova , the Ukraine or Russia . Another interesting detail is the fact that Radcenko's headquarters in under the same almost “studied” siege for years now, while giving a few interviews during those years. If we add to that the positions the two occupied in the Smirnov regime, we can suspect that this is also a tolerated position – if not created – by the MGB structures. What would be the purpose? To give the impression to OSCE and to other international factors that Transnistria has opposition and a free press. The rest of the NGO's are much more transparently related to the internal security services. Public founds, government vehicles, or even founding members from the secret service. “Transnistria has a low political culture. But the Smirnov government can not arrest all the people who won't submit. That's why they left the newspapers alone (the newspapers belonging to Buceatki and to Radcenko....), they issue very few copies. Moreover, Smirnov can tell anyone that there is opposition in Transnistria” declared Boris Asarov, the president of the NGO “Pro Europe”. Asarov cannot enter Transnistria because he would be arrested for breaking the constitutional order. He has a penal file on his name, after protesting against the Supreme Soviet and the stationary Russian troops. When meeting him in Chisinau, he promised to provide documents to prove Transnistria's recent involvement into weapons trafficking. The following day he conditioned giving the documents with us publishing an exclusive interview with him and a box of R1. | |||
| The only annalist we have been recommended as an independent and living in Tiraspol is Andrei Safonov. Because of security reasons, he refused to meet us in Transnistria and he insisted on visiting us to the apartment where we lived: “Basically, I would appreciate the situation in Transnistria as more bearable than the one in Belarus .” | |||
| ===PRESS === | |||
| In Transnistria we have identified 114 journalists, registered in an official organization, 14 newspapers and four TV channels. We couldn't find all newspapers at the stands; the smaller the town, the fewer are the newspapers for sale. Besides the three newspapers we mentioned above, and belonging to the opposition, the rest of the media products are divided into the ones owned by the government and the one owned by Sheriff. There is also a publication issued by Proriv, whose founding member is a MGB officer. The same Sheriff owns the only cable TV operator in Transnistria, where no one can watch channels also watched in Moldova . The internet communication is the monopoly of the Smirnovs, who took over through Sheriff the former public company Interdnestrcom, using for mobile communication the 3G – CDMA – standard brought in by the American company Lucent Technologies. Thus, everything that means access to information is made through the provider Interdnestrcom. | |||
| Alexander Radcenko As a foreign journalist, it is almost impossible to work openly, because MGB might refuse access to any journalist or might decide to get him monitored while working. Once one declares to be a journalist, even taxi drivers know that you must get credentials from officials and they ask for it. On the other hand, there were registered many cases where foreign journalists caught working without credentials, were got into custody and all the material obtained was confiscated. Generally speaking, Romanian journalists are considered to be spies. | |||
| ===The Elite === | |||
| Connections between the internal security, business environment and the political elite are more and more obvious. A handful of people took positions, then made fortunes, and won places in the Supreme Soviet. A good example is Oleg Voronin that besides being head of customs and manager of Sheriff has also become deputy in the Supreme Soviet. | |||
| Basically, nowadays there are two political forces in Transnistria: The Respublica movement, a pro-presidential structure and the Obnovlenie (Renewal) movement, a structure where all main economic actors belong to, beginning with the business men of Sheriff. But a closer look at he resumes of the political elite shows that basically we are to deal with a family affair. For example, in the presidential structure we can also find the wife of the security minister, Galina Antiufeeva. Ironically, she is a member of the amnesty presidential committee. Moreover, Antiufeeva is the president of the Supreme Soviet Committee for Law, Rights and Freedom of the Citizens. | |||
| Ilya Kazmaly (or Ilie Cazmalii) is deputy manager with Sheriff and at the same time, he is a deputy in the Supreme Soviet. He is a former Tiraspol Militia officer; he participated in arresting Ilie Ilascu and other fighters against the separatists. Cazmalii was the right hand of Victor Gusan, who is now the manager of Sheriff. They both worked for the Ministry of Interior in Tiraspol . Gusan had a more important position, and he directly participated in arresting Ilascu. They both served under the MGB, and in the years following the conflict they participated in creating and developing the Sheriff empire, in the name of the Smirnovs. | |||
| Boris Asarov Oleg Baev, manager of the Wine and alcohol liquors factory KVINT, got to the position of Parliament member. The same happened to Anatoli Belitchenko and to Andrei Iudin, both managers of MMZ from Rabnita. Elena Chernenko, the minister of privatization, takes the job of chief accountant to an Italian - Transnistrian company right after graduating. The press accuses the minister of privatization of being involved between '96 and '98 in a tax dodging case of 7 billion Transnistrian rubles, when she was the chief accountant of with Tirpa. The file was quickly closed and the former chief accountant was promoted to the position of minister of economy, where she started a long run of suspicious privatizations. And the list could go on. To this entire list, one can add the wives and children of all the above-mentioned, who slowly enter the new Transnistrian elite, receiving official governmental positions. | |||
| ==Nostalgia for the Soviet Union== | |||
| Smirnov, the president, has suggested that Trans-Dniester suffers in part because of his unconcealed nostalgia for the Soviet Union. | |||
| Trans-Dniester and Moldova both elect their presidents. But while Moldova is on a reformist, pro-Western course, Trans-Dniester keeps its Soviet habits and discipline. The streets are largely empty, but everyone uses crosswalks and waits for the lights to change. Slogans endorsing Soviet-era solidarity and cooperation are freshly painted on walls and buildings. | |||
| After school, teenagers gather along the left bank of the Dniester River to strum guitars and talk about what they'll do when they get out _ to Moscow, to Kiev, to Odessa, wherever."Moscow is a big city and that's where the opportunities are,"said Aleksandra Luchkova, 16, in fluent English. | |||
| The population has fallen 20 percent in 16 years; in 2004, 5,000 babies were born, down from 12,000 in 1992. The wait for Russian citizenship and a passport can be two years. Meanwhile, to get in and out requires passing through five separate checkpoints. | |||
| For the referendum, Dmitry Soin, head of a state security committee, whipped up the youth vote to burn Moldovan flags and ride giant American tractors through Tiraspol's streets under banners of Che Guevara. | |||
| "We are waking up Trans-Dniester youth,"said Soin, 37, sipping espresso in a dimly lit cafe."I'm not going to say we don't have a problem with youth migration, but I don't think it's so unusual. Youth, the world over, are very mobile and dream of escaping to somewhere new." | |||
| The students set up a tent camp with the help of a pro-Kremlin youth group brought in from Russia. But on referendum day, the tents were empty and blown away by the wind. | |||
| Soin, who played a key role in 2004 efforts to close Moldovan-language schools in Trans-Dniester, doesn't leave the territory because he is wanted by Interpol for premeditated murder in connection with two killings in 1994 and 1995 while serving in the Trans-Dniester security service. | |||
| He says Moldova is pushing the charge as punishment for his independence efforts. Moldova accuses him of stirring ethnic hatred and creating paramilitary organizations. | |||
| ==$200 million of Sheriff company == | |||
| Analysts say it's hard to know what is really going on because so little is revealed and business deals are murky. A giant sports complex that reportedly cost around $200 million went up a few years ago on the outskirts of Tiraspol. Its owner, the Sheriff company, also manages supermarkets and gas stations, and is one of the few businesses that are allowed to trade openly in dollars rather than in Trans-Dniester's weaker ruble currency. | |||
| The company is reportedly linked to Smirnov's family, an allegation the president and his entourage deny. | |||
| Smirnov is driven around in a humble Skoda, and generally, wealth is not flaunted in Trans-Dniester, where many residents survive on $50 a month, though officials insist the average salary is three times higher. | |||
| "There has been a big, and not unsuccessful, effort to keep people satisfied with their salaries and pensions,"Cibotaru, the Moldovan analyst, said. | |||
| On a bright Sunday afternoon, people packed a main street pizza parlor, 7th Day, and streamed in and out of Mickey's, which advertises 16 types of hamburger toppings. | |||
| "It's not correct to say that life here is bleak,"said Valentina Beslar, 45, as she waited for a trolley bus near a monument to fallen soldiers."But, ofcourse, everyone dreams of better _ and for us that means joining Russia, if they'll have us." | |||
| ==See also== | |||
| * ] (football club) | |||
| == External links == | |||
| * | |||
| * | |||
| * | |||
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Latest revision as of 19:13, 5 November 2024
Company in Transnistria
| [REDACTED] | |
| Native name | Шериф |
|---|---|
| Company type | Corporate group |
| Industry | Various |
| Founded | 24 June 1993; 31 years ago (1993-06-24) |
| Founders | Viktor Gushan |
| Headquarters | Tiraspol, Transnistria |
| Area served | Transnistria |
| Key people |
|
| Owner | Viktor Gushan |
| Number of employees | 13,157 (2012) |
| Website | sheriff |
![[REDACTED]](https://u3vuiephb.global.ssl.fastly.net/File:Sheriff_logo.png){kind=link}
Sheriff (Russian: Шериф) is the second-largest company in the unrecognised breakaway state Transnistria, behind Moldova Steel Works. Based in the city of Tiraspol, it was formed in the early 1990s by Viktor Gushan and Ilya Kazmaly, former members of the KGB. Sheriff has grown to include nearly all forms of profitable private business in the unrecognised country, and has even become significantly involved in local politics and sport, with some commentators saying that company loyalists hold most main government positions in the territory. Anatoly Dirun, director of the Tiraspol School of Political Studies, stated that "Viktor Gushan is the person with the most influence here, both in politics and economics."
Company
Sheriff owns a chain of petrol stations, a chain of supermarkets, a TV channel, a publishing house, a construction company, a Mercedes-Benz dealer, an advertising agency, a distillery, two bread factories, a mobile phone network, the football club FC Sheriff Tiraspol and its home ground Sheriff Stadium, a project which also included a five-star hotel.
Political dealings and corruption
Due to Transnistrian government policies that have isolated the region from the rest of Moldova, Sheriff holds a monopoly in multiple industries in the unrecognized state. In the early years, this has also led to corruption between the government of Igor Smirnov and Sheriff. Where the company would support Transnistrian government policy and in return, the customs service, which was headed by the president's son, Vladimir, gave Sheriff an unfair reduction on taxes and import duties and is also said to be a major silent partner among the leadership of the company. Some media sources have also claimed that Oleg Smirnov, who was another son of Igor Smirnov, was a part of top leadership of Sheriff company, though these claims have never been directly proven and following after 2006 the leadership of Sheriff have publicly opposed Smirnov's politics. Mysteriously following the 2011 Transnistrian presidential election which Igor ended up losing, allegations of Smirnov's clan involvement in Sheriff disappeared from articles about Transnistria.
Over the years, Transnistria's indeterminate status has slowed the growth of Sheriff. When a new party, Renewal, was formed in 2000 which had the goal of Transnistrian independence from Moldova and also supported big business interests, Sheriff supported them, and Sheriff co-founder IIya Kazmaly, as well as the company's Human Resources Director, Ilona Tyuryaeva, were elected to serve in Transnistrian parliament as members of Renewal.
Sheriff has used its economic clout to sway elections in Transnistria, by virtue of their ownership of the country's mobile/landline phone network and of TSV, a local television station. In the 2005 parliamentary elections, the Sheriff-supported Renewal party gained an absolute majority in Transnistrian parliament, winning 23 of 43 seats. This victory ousted the long-time Speaker of Parliament Grigori Maracutsa, who was replaced with Renewal leader Evgeny Shevchuk, who also had strong ties to Sheriff.
Following this electoral win, the government of president Smirnov later accused Shevchuk and Sheriff of plotting a coup d'état in Transnistria, claiming that Sheriff was plotting to reintegrate Transnistria with Moldova, in return for profitable business conditions for the company there. The claims were later denied by Sheriff, which maintained that they also desire independence from Moldova. Following multiple attacks between the two parties, Smirnov ended received the support of the Russian government against Sheriff, and Shevchuk disappeared almost entirely from the media despite being the president of Transnistria, and did not register to be a candidate in the 2006 Transnistrian presidential election. However, in the 2011 Transnistrian presidential election, Shevchuk beat both Igor Smirnov and Renewal's new leader Anatoliy Kaminski to become president. On 29 December 2012, Shevchuk issued a decree abolishing all preferences previously granted to Sheriff by Igor Smirnov and ended the period of the company's unfair market position in Transnistria's economy.
In 2015, it was alleged that roughly one third of all the money from the Transnistrian budget was paid out to companies owned by Sheriff.
Notes and references
- "Экономическая результативность". sheriff.md. Archived from the original on 30 September 2018. Retrieved 3 October 2018.
- ^ "Transnistria 2006: Is Regime Change Underway?". BHHRG online. British Helsinki Human Rights Group. January 2006. Archived from the original on 27 September 2007.
- "Crypto and Caviar: The Empire behind Footballing Giant Slayer 'Sheriff'". Balkan Insight. 11 October 2021. Archived from the original on 13 December 2021. Retrieved 13 December 2021.
- ^ Gershkovich, Evan (27 September 2021). "In Separatist Transnistria, Sheriff Calls the Shots". AFP. Archived from the original on 13 December 2021. Retrieved 13 December 2021 – via The Moscow Times.
- "Sports in Pridnestrovie: Going for Gold". Archived from the original on 24 October 2010. Retrieved 22 October 2006.
- ^ Solovyev, V. & Zygar M. (19 September 2006). The Old Guard Wins in Transdniestria. Archived 6 June 2011 at the Wayback Machine Kommersant: Russia's Daily Online Archived 2 November 2006 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 2006-11-08.
- McCracken, Patti (12 February 2006). "A place the world chooses to forget: Moldova's breakaway region is a pawn in its fight with Russia." Archived 24 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine The San Francisco Chronicle. Archived 24 October 2014 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved 2006-11-17.
- Jahn, George (18 January 2004). "Hotbed of Weapons Deals." Archived 22 March 2007 at the Wayback Machine The Washington Times. Archived 30 August 2009 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved 2006-11-17.
- ^ "Moldova's Future Uncertain." Archived 11 March 2007 at the Wayback Machine (PDF). International Crisis Group. Archived 20 May 2016 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved 8 November 2006.
- Protsyk, Oleh. "Moldova's Dilemmas in Democratizing and Reintegrating Transnistria." Archived 27 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine (PDF). International Policy Fellowships. Archived 15 October 2008 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved 8 November 2006.
- ^ "Renewal, Pridnestrovie's reformist opposition party." Archived 1 May 2016 at the Wayback Machine pridnestrovie.net. Archived 22 July 2010 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved 8 November 2006.
- ^ Botan, Igor (17 January 2006). "Democracy and governing in Moldova." Archived 22 February 2006 at the Wayback Machine E-Democracy. Archived 20 November 2006 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved 2006-11-16.
- "Официальный сайт Верховного Совета Приднестровской Молдавской Республики". www.vspmr.org. Archived from the original on 23 May 2011. Retrieved 1 November 2006.
- "Four Persons Run For Head of Transnistria" Archived 27 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine, Retrieved 13 November 2006.
- "An aided economy. The characteristics of the Transnistrian economic model". OSW Centre for Eastern Studies. 16 May 2013. Archived from the original on 17 April 2021. Retrieved 20 March 2021.
- "Нас ждут «голые» полки магазинов? Профсоюзные Вести, 16 February 2013". Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 11 July 2013.
External links
- [REDACTED] Media related to Sheriff (company) at Wikimedia Commons
- Official website
![[REDACTED]](https://u3vuiephb.global.ssl.fastly.net/File:Commons-logo.svg){kind=link}