Moldovan authorities are seeing “massive interference” by Russia in the country’s runoff vote for the presidency, an official has said.
The incumbent president’s national security adviser Stanislav Secrieru described it as “an effort with high potential to distort the outcome”.
Moldova is voting in a presidential election which could determine the country’s future as a nation bidding to join the EU or getting closer to Russia.
Pro-Western incumbent Maia Sandu is facing a second and final round against Alexandr Stoianoglo, a former prosecutor general backed by the pro-Russian Socialist Party.
Ms Sandu has been championing Moldova’s effort to join the EU by 2030, while Mr Stoianoglo said that as president he too would back EU integration but also develop ties with Russia in the national interest.
He has vowed to try to revive cheap Russian gas supplies and said he would meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin if Moldovans wanted it.
In the first round held on 20 October, Ms Sandu obtained 42% of the ballot but failed to win an outright majority.
Mr Stoianoglo outperformed polls in the first round with almost 26% of the vote.
Moldova, an eastern European country of three million people, narrowly voted for closer ties to the European Union in a referendum last month which was dominated by claims of Russian interference.
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‘Criminal groups bribed Moldovan voters’
A European Union spokesman claimed at the time there had been “unprecedented intimidation and foreign interference by Russia and its proxies” as Ms Sandu accused groups “working together with foreign forces” of trying to buy 300,000 votes.
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During the campaign, Ms Sandu has portrayed Mr Stoianoglo as the Kremlin’s man and a political Trojan horse.
Mr Stoianoglo says that is untrue and that she has failed to look out for the interests of ordinary Moldovans.
Moscow has said her government is “Russophobic”.
The EU is expected to watch the Moldovan election closely as it comes a week after Georgia, another ex-Soviet state hoping to join the 27-member state bloc, re-elected a ruling party seen as increasingly pro-Russian.
The president told Sky News that the election was “stolen”.