RISE Moldova (Romanian : Asociația Reporterilor de Investigație și Securitate Editorială; The Association of Investigative Reporters and Editorial Security) is an independent, non-governmental and nonprofit organization consisting of investigative journalists, programmers and activists from Moldova and Romania. [1] [2] Investigations made by RISE Moldova journalists were shortlisted for the European Press Prize for two years in a row. [3] [4]
RISE Moldova was founded in March 2014 by ex-Ziarul de Gardă journalists Iurie Sanduta, Nicolae Cuschevici and ex-Adevărul Moldova reporter Ion Preasca. Current members list also includes but not limited to the following journalists: Mihai Munteanu, Olga Ceaglei, Vladimir Thoric, Dumitru Lazur, Doina Ipatii and Dumitru Stoianov. [1] Project's activity was launched with grants from United States Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor and Open Society Foundations. [5] [6]
Since its launch RISE Moldova has investigated and published materials, stories and filmed short documentaries on such subjects as corruption, conflict of interests and cross border organised crime schemes and networks. First investigation signed by RISE Moldova started in 2013, when RISE journalists cooperated with colleagues from United Kingdom, Romania and Russia to uncover complex illegal business and criminal schemes behind a cross border network of assassins-for-hire operating throughout Europe. [7] [8] This investigation was a finalist at the 2013 European Press Prize. [3] [9]
Another investigation, named "Russian Laundromat", revealed international money laundering scheme that moved tens billions dollars into Europe using offshore companies, fake loans and bribed Moldovan judges. Some of the Russian banks involved were owned in part by Igor Putin, cousin of Russian President Vladimir Putin. [10] [11] It was named the best investigation of 2014 by Centre of Independent Journalism of Moldova. [12] It was also shortlisted for the 2014 European Press Prize [4] and won The Special Jury Award. [13] [14]
Other important cross border investigations covered such themes as arms smuggling from Transnistria to Ukraine and international routes in Asia; [15] [16] [17] [18] hidden wealth of the Moldovan politicians; [19] [20] [21] [22] the business of priests in Moldova and church's connection to the underworld. [23] [24] [25] [26]
On March 11, 2015, RISE Moldova became first media outlet to unveil names of Moldovans linked to SwissLeaks case. RISE published documents on secret accounts held by eight Moldovan emigrants at Swiss bank HSBC with total amount of $22,8 million. These documents were obtained via International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) network. [27] [28] [29]
RISE Moldova was part of global investigative project Panama Papers and was the only media outlet from Moldova which received access to the leaked Mossack Fonseca documents. The first Panama Papers story on public person from Moldova was published on April 4, 2016, and was about business ties and offshore connections of ex-prime minister of Moldova Ion Sturza. [30] [31] [32] [33] The documents were initially received by the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung and shared by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project. [34] [35]
RISE Moldova activates in the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, [36] a regional organization which gathers investigative journalism associations from Eastern Europe. Other partnerships include Global Investigative Journalism Network, [37] n-ost [38] and RISE Project. [39]
Ion Sturza is a Moldovan politician and businessman who served as Prime Minister of Moldova from 19 February to 12 November 1999. On 21 December 2015, President Nicolae Timofti nominated Ion Sturza to occupy the position of prime minister for a second time. However, Ion Sturza gave up the mandate, after the meeting in which his cabinet should receive the investiture vote was not held due to lack of quorum.
Veaceslav Platon is a Moldovan businessman and former member of the Parliament of Moldova from 2009 to 2010. He also holds Russian citizenship.
Mariana Raţă is an investigative and TV journalist from Moldova. She is the founder of the Media Alternativa association, which holds the license of the independent television station TV8. Rață is Senior Editor at TV8, responsible for the editorial policy of TV8 media products. Since 2017, Rață is the host of the political talk show Cutia Neagră, and since 2020, she is also the director of the investigation show Cutia Neagră PLUS. Both are broadcast by TV8. Since 2017, Rață is the chairman of the Board of Directors of the Center for Independent Journalism in Moldova.
The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) is a global network of investigative journalists with staff on six continents. It was founded in 2006 and specializes in organized crime and corruption.
Vladimir Plahotniuc, commonly referred to as Vlad Plahotniuc, is a Moldovan politician, businessman and oligarch. He was the chairman of the Democratic Party of Moldova and previously was a member of the Parliament of Moldova for three terms, and served as First Vice President of the Parliament of Moldova. Until leaving the territory of the Republic of Moldova in 2019, he was considered to be the powerhouse of Moldovan politics in matters of influence, controlling Moldova's government and parliamentary majority. Since fleeing Moldova in June 2019, Plahotniuc has resided in Turkey.
Nicolae Andronic is a Moldovan jurist and lawyer. He served as member of Parliament of Moldova between 1990 and 1998 and as Deputy Speaker of the Parliament of Moldova in 1994. He headed the extra-parliamentary Republican Popular Party from 2005 to 2015.
RISE Project is a Romanian non-profit journalism organization founded in early 2012 by a group of investigative journalists, activists, programmers and graphic designers.
The Panama Papers are 11.5 million leaked documents that were published beginning on April 3, 2016. The papers detail financial and attorney–client information for more than 214,488 offshore entities. The documents, some dating back to the 1970s, were created by, and taken from, former Panamanian offshore law firm and corporate service provider Mossack Fonseca, and compiled with similar leaks into a searchable database.
Ramón Fonseca Mora was a Panamanian novelist, lawyer and co-founder of Mossack Fonseca, a former law firm based in Panama with more than 40 offices worldwide. He was minister-counselor of Panamanian President Juan Carlos Varela, and president of the Panameñista Party until he was dismissed in March 2016, due to the Brazilian Operation Car Wash anti-corruption probe.
Jürgen Rolf Dieter Mossack is a German-born Panamanian lawyer and the co-founder of Mossack Fonseca, a former law firm headquartered in Panama City which had more than 40 offices worldwide. The firm gained global notoriety in 2016 when it found itself at the centre of the Panama Papers affair, which uncovered the activities of the offshore finance industry. According to the leaked papers, Mossack Fonseca set up more than 214,000 shell companies around the world, some of which were found to have been used for illegal purposes, including fraud and tax evasion. In 2016, Mossack Fonseca was raided by police on suspicion of money-laundering, bribery and corruption. Mossack and his partner Ramón Fonseca Mora were arrested and jailed on 10 February 2017. They were initially refused bail because the court saw a flight risk, but were released on 21 April 2017 after a judge ruled they had cooperated with the investigation and ordered them each to pay $500,000 in bail. Numerous lawsuits including serious allegations of collusion with despotic regimes, mafia, and global criminals are ongoing.
Frederik Obermaier is a German investigative journalist for the Munich-based newspaper, Süddeutsche Zeitung, and author. Together with his colleague Bastian Obermayer in 2016 he initiated and coordinated the Panama Papers-revelations.
Jake Bernstein is an American investigative journalist and author. He previously worked with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. During a 25-year career, he has reported on the civil war in Central America, industrial pollution in Texas, political corruption in Miami, system-crashing greed on Wall Street, and the secret world of offshore accounts and money laundering. He has written travel pieces, reviewed movies and books, and has appeared as a radio and TV journalist.
The Filip Cabinet was the Cabinet of Moldova led by Pavel Filip from January 2016 to June 2019.
The Daphne Project is a collaborative, cross-border investigative journalism project by major news organizations from around the world, coordinated by Paris-based investigative non-profit newsroom, Forbidden Stories, to continue the work of Maltese investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia. Their work has been facilitated through the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), a member of Global Investigative Journalism Network. They published their first in a series of reports in April 2018.
Bivol.bg, also known as Bivol, is an investigative media based in Bulgaria which is part of the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project network and an official partner of WikiLeaks.
The Panama Papers are 11.5 million leaked documents that detail financial and attorney–client information for more than 214,488 offshore entities. The documents, some dating back to the 1970s, were created by, and taken from, Panamanian law firm and corporate service provider Mossack Fonseca, and were leaked in 2015 by an anonymous source.
Roman Aleksandrovich Anin is a Russian investigative journalist. He is one of the founders of the independent iStories outlet and a former journalist for the Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta. The main investigation in which he was involved is the investigation of the Panama Papers.
Olesya Valentinovna Shmagun is a Russian investigative journalist. She worked for the Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta and the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP). Shmagun is one of the founders of the iStories media outlet.
The Pandora Papers are 11.9 million leaked documents with 2.9 terabytes of data that the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) published beginning on 3 October 2021. The leak exposed the secret offshore accounts of 35 world leaders, including current and former presidents, prime ministers, and heads of state as well as more than 100 business leaders, billionaires, and celebrities. The news organizations of the ICIJ described the document leak as their most expansive exposé of financial secrecy yet, containing documents, images, emails and spreadsheets from 14 financial service companies, in nations including Panama, Switzerland and the United Arab Emirates. The size of the leak surpassed their previous release of the Panama Papers in 2016, which had 11.5 million confidential documents and 2.6 terabytes of data. The ICIJ said it is not identifying its source for the documents.
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