USAID was behind the protests of April 7, 2009 in Chișinău, the then-president of Moldova, Vladimir Voronin, says amidst discussions on the organization's dissolution.
NEWS: Did you hear what Musk and others are saying? In the last 50 years, they [USAID] have overthrown 62 governments. They, their representatives, Alex Grigorievs, who staged the protests here. Who is the author of the destruction of Yugoslavia? Alex Grigorievs. Who is the mastermind of the Orange Revolution here? Who is behind the revolution of April 7, 2009? Alex Grigorievs, a US citizen, born in Lithuania.
[...] I knew then and there [that USAID was involved], we get our information from competent people, even from inside the group that staged the revolution in Chișinău.
NARRATIVES: 1. USAID organized the “Twitter revolution” of April 7, 2009. 2. USAID is an organization that has interfered with the internal affairs of several states in the world.
PURPOSE: To fuel narratives about USAID's involvement in the internal affairs of several states in order to question the role of this organization in promoting democracy and development projects.
WHY THE NARRATIVES ARE FALSE: In April 2009, the government led by Vladimir Voronin claimed that the so-called “Twitter revolution” was organized/directed from abroad and, in particular, from Romania. This type of narrative resembles those promoted by Russia in ex-Soviet space for more than two decades, with Moscow stating that every “color revolution” (i.e. a pro-democracy and/or anti-corruption grassroots movement) was organized and instigated by external forces that wanted to install their own puppet governments. This is the first time that Voronin makes the link between USAID and the protests of April 7, 2009. At the time, when Vladimir Voronin held the position of president and leader of the Communist Party, in power since 2001, young people and the opposition organized street protests accusing fraud in the April 5 election. The protests turned violent, apparently as a result of instigators, which resulted in the partial destruction and burning of the Parliament building and, to a lesser extent, the Presidency. At least one protester was killed. The government and the opposition accused each other of instigating the crowds, and Voronin then accused Romania in particular of being behind the protests. Chișinău expelled the Romanian ambassador at the time and introduced visas for Romanian citizens.
The protests and reports of torture in police stations that followed further divided the Moldovan society and political class. In the ensuing snap elections, the allegedly pro-European opposition seized power.
A special parliamentary inquiry committee concluded that it “cannot describe the events of April 2009 as an attempted coup d’état or a putsch”, as the communist leaders of the time had claimed, and that these events must be interpreted in an electoral context. The committee found that law enforcement agencies were unable to get a grip of the situation, and moreover, “it is very possible that the nighttime fires in the Parliament building broke out when the building was already under the control of law enforcement agencies,” and that Vladimir Voronin overstepped his prerogatives.
Alex Grigorievs, the individual Vladimir Voronin refers to, was at that time country director at the National Democratic Institute (NDI), an organization that promotes the strengthening of democratic institutions and participatory democracy. It is unclear what drove Voronin to say that Grigorievs was the author of the destruction of the former Yugoslavia. According to his LinkedIn resume, Grigorievs had worked at NDI since 1996, and by the end of 1999 he was in Russia.
Apart from unconfirmed allegations, there is no evidence of USAID’s involvement in the internal affairs of certain countries. USAID is recognized for its social and humanitarian assistance projects in many countries around the world, especially underdeveloped states. The international media has written that its closure and freezing of funds will affect a large number of people across the planet.
BACKGROUND: The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has been viewed with suspicion in some circles for decades. Over the years, its name has been tied to a number of conspiracy theories, including accusations of involvement in coups and the development of biological weapons. USAID ended up in the crosshairs of individuals close to Donald Trump in recent months, including Elon Musk, who has promoted false narratives about the agency. After Donald Trump took office, USAID's activity was suspended for 90 days, and later, the president called for its dissolution.
Set up during the Cold War by the Kennedy administration, USAID has financed projects around the world in various fields, aimed both at improving the lives of people in underdeveloped countries and at strengthening democracy, including in ex-Soviet states such as the Republic of Moldova.
USAID has contributed over a billion dollars to the development of the Republic of Moldova since 1992 – the funds being invested in education, agriculture, viticulture, tourism, light industries, IT, public administration, justice, combating corruption, energy, and the materialized projects can be seen in several communities where roads, schools and nursery schools have been repaired. Its largest program in the Republic of Moldova was announced in 2022, after the start of Russia's large-scale invasion of Ukraine – the Energy Security of the Republic of Moldova program, worth 300 million dollars, which provides for the construction of the Gutinaș-Strășeni high-voltage overhead line linking Romania to the Republic of Moldova, Ziarul de Gardă writes.
Shortly after the Trump administration decided to suspend the activity of USAID, Prime Minister Dorin Recean declared that “the decision will have a limited impact”. However, just a week before the decision, Recean had signed with the USAID representative in Moldova a grant of approximately $70 million designed to modernize transportat infrastructure.
Several mainstream media outlets in Chișinău were operating partly based on funding received from USAID. The decision also caused confusion and concern in the Moldovan wine industry, one the country’s best-performing and most appreciated sectors, which in recent years was modernized partly thanks to American support.
