CHISINAU/TIRASPOL, June 15 (RIA Novosti) - Moldova's delegation to a commission regulating the ongoing conflict around the country's breakaway Transdnestr region called Thursday for a special session after five Moldovan policemen were arrested in the province.
The policemen were arrested Wednesday by Transdnestr special forces. Ion Leahu, the head of the Moldovan delegation to the Joint Control Commission, said: "We want to clarify what will happen to the police officers and ascertain on what grounds they were arrested, since these are members of the JCC's operational investigative group."
The JCC is responsible for security in the buffer zone between Moldova and unrecognized Transdnestr, and also includes representatives from Russia, which has had peacekeepers in the area since it intervened in a conflict between Moldova and Transdnestr in July 1992.
Leahu said the JCC had not managed to address the issue at its scheduled meeting on Thursday because of a lack of consensus.
Moldova addressed the Transdnestr's interior ministry and security service over the arrests, but has not received any satisfactory explanation, he said.
On Thursday Moldovan Interior Minister Georgi Papuk criticized the move. "The arrest of the investigators was absolutely illegal," he said, adding that it was "a provocation from local law-enforcement agencies, and primarily the so-called State Security Service."
The minister called on Transdnestr's authorities to release the officers and return to constructive cooperation in fighting crime.
Transdnestr's state security minister said he had sent a letter to the Moldovan authorities asking for clarification of what the officers were doing in the region, why they were outside the conflict zone and why their actions had not been coordinated with Transdnestr's authorities. The ministry has not yet received a reply to these questions, he said.
