The Ministry of Defense on Thursday debunked fresh disinformation targeting Romanians in the diaspora after several people said documents were sent to their home asking them to report to military recruitment centers in Romania.
The Defense Ministry said the documents were fake and warned that disinformation “aimed at amplifying fear and uncertainty, in the context of the war in Ukraine,” would continue.
It was the second case of disinformation about a military call-up in recent days. The interior ministry was forced to debunk claims that Romania was about to be pulled into ‘military conflict’ and men aged 18-35 would be called drafted to help military operations in Ukraine.
Of the latest scam, the ministry said: “We would like to inform you of a disinformation campaign targeting Romanian citizens living abroad. Some of them have recently reported to us that they received a document of the type presented in the facsimile, saying they would be summoned to a military center in the country for “the evaluation and initiation of recruitment procedures within the Armed Forces of Romania”.
“ This document is false! The Ministry of National Defense has not sent such notices to any Romanian citizen, regardless of whether they live in the country or abroad,” the ministry said Thursday.
It called on Romanians to “verify from official sources the alarmist and sensationalist information they come into contact with, before redistributing it in the public space,” the Defense Ministry said.
It analyzed the latest document and presented the forgeries.
“A brief analysis of this forgery shows that the structure mentioned in the header of the so-called “document”, namely the “Recruitment Department” does not exist in the Defense Ministry and the stamp is grossly falsified. Also, there is no officer in the ministry staff with the name and position of the individual who “signed” this forgery,” the institution also said.
The ministry said it will notify judicial authorities, in order to identify the authors of this disinformation and take legal action.
It invoked Article 404 (2) of the Criminal Code, which provides: “The communication or dissemination, by any means, of false news, data or information or falsified documents, knowing their false nature, if this endangers national security, shall be punished with a prison sentence of one to 5 years.”
“The disinformation we are reporting continues the series of actions that speculate on the context generated by the war of aggression that the Russian Federation is currently waging in Ukraine. We remind you that the execution of compulsory service as a full-time military and short-term military has been suspended in peacetime in Romania, starting on January 1, 2007, under Law 395/2005 on the peacetime suspension of compulsory military service and the transition to military service on a voluntary basis”, defense ministry officials said.
Compulsory military service occurs “during the state of war, the state of mobilization, as well as during the state of siege, the execution of military service becomes mandatory, under the conditions of the law.”
