With Moldova headed to the ballot box on 28 September for parliamentary elections, Russia's information operations are scripting a nefarious storyline, one all too familiar to the Ukrainian people. While Russia has routinely meddled in Moldovan politics, it recently upped the ante when its foreign intelligence service brazenly claimed that after Sunday’s elections, the EU intends to occupy Moldova on the false pretence that it must bring peace to an unstable post-election situation. Simultaneously, it claimed that NATO forces were preparing to "land" in Odesa to intimidate pro-Russian Transnistrians from taking any actions to destabilise Moldova. While unverified and assuredly false, the timing and framing of this information operation echo the early cues documented in Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine. Specifically, they continue to employ a distinct form of disinformation known as "information alibis".

Information alibis involve the preemptive dissemination of false information, carefully crafted to deflect responsibility for international crimes from the actual perpetrator or state onto another party for the crime it plans to commit. By constructing these deceptive narratives, Russia aims to commit crimes with impunity - absolving itself of culpability through the manipulation of the information landscape as an integral contribution to the criminal act. This tactic represents a cynical weaponisation of rhetoric as a tool of hybrid warfare operations and ultimately international crimes, including the crime of aggression, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and even genocide.

Ukraine knows this playbook. As described by Global Rights Compliance and The Reckoning Project in their recent report entitled ‘Manufacturing Impunity: Russian Information Operations in Ukraine‘, prior to the attacks on the Mariupol Drama Theatre, Kakhovka Dam, Olenivka POW camp, and other crimes against the Ukrainian people, a similar tactic was deployed. State bodies and Telegram channels disseminated an alternative narrative - one that was directly counter to Russia’s operational plan - and widely publicised them before, during and after attacks until the false narrative partially obscured the crime and the truth. Its aim was to facilitate the crime through creating doubt about the responsible party and to cloud the public conversation long enough to advance its military, geopolitical and criminal objectives.

This information operation - the claim of an EU occupation of Moldova and a NATO incursion into Odesa - is not mere propaganda. It is an information alibi that may be invoked to justify future aggression against Moldova and a range of international crimes against those perceived to be opponents to the criminal plan. It could also be weaponised for further aggression against the Odesa oblast and, as is the norm with Russian military operations, a myriad of attacks against civilians.

Why is Russia Taking the Information Alibi Playbook to Moldova?

Russia's principal motivation for creating instability in Moldova is to block its EU accession, as membership is viewed in Moscow as a direct challenge to its tired, antiquated claim of Moldova being in its so-called ‘sphere of influence’. In addition, because the EU has informally linked the accession processes of Moldova and Ukraine, obstructing Moldova's path carries the incidental ‘benefit’ of also slowing Ukraine’s progress.

By fuelling an information war in Moldova (see recent investigations by BBC and Ziarul de Gardă), spending hundreds of millions of euros to "take power" in parliamentary elections, and leveraging its presence in Transnistria, the Kremlin aims to either install a pro-Russian government or create a non-functioning parliament. This approach not only keeps Moldova more politically and economically distant from EU member-states, it also weakens Ukraine's western neighbour and undermines the EU's enlargement policy. 

Crucially, these measures appear to be only part of a layered strategy aimed at regaining Russia’s hegemonic presence in the region. If the other actions above fail to achieve Moscow's objectives, the information alibi described above lays the foundation for the use of force in violation of the UN Charter and, as with Ukraine, opening the door to a range of other international crimes. 

What Moldova Should Do to Counter Russia’s Information Alibis

Moldova and other states should treat Russian disinformation, particularly information alibis, as early warning signals of a criminal plan and move to counter such narratives expeditiously. They are not only propaganda - they are the means to achieve a clear plan of aggression that will involve attacks on a States’s sovereignty and against its civilians. Moldova should track, verify, and publicly rebut major claims, establishing a public record so Moldovan citizens can see the core truth that contradicts Russia’s dangerous narratives and help to undermine its plan. Finally, it should coordinate with trusted media and civil society to ‘red flag’ information alibis before they spread.

In addition to establishing an effective communications strategy, Moldova should document Russia’s information alibis for potential accountability mechanisms in the future. Specifically, it should examine whether the information alibi campaign is evidence of a criminal plan with a violation of the UN Charter's prohibition on the use of force. 

As Moldova approaches the 28 September elections, Ukraine’s experience offers a clear lesson that narratives seeded in advance may not be empty disinformation but potential evidence of intent to carry out acts prohibited under international law. Moscow’s information alibi in Moldova appears designed to manufacture a pretext for the use of force and, in legal terms, may constitute part of the means designed to perpetrate a violation of Article 2(4) of the UN Charter and enable the perpetration of international crimes. From Kyiv to Chișinău, the strategy remains clear for countering information alibis: identify the Russian playbook, rebut the information and let Moldova’s future be determined by its citizens – not by manufactured pretexts to corrupt democracy or justify an act of aggression. 

Scott Martin,international legal advisor with Global Rights Compliance