User talk:William Mauco/Crime (sandbox)

The section which we ought to edit is the one labelled "Crime" which is part of Transnistria. It currently has two subheadings: "Smuggling" and "Weapons trade and domestic terrorism".

Background

TSO1D, here's some background for why an overhaul is timely now.

Mauco

Personally, I think it is a mess of "too many cooks" trying to put together a stew that in the end is just confusing to read. Right now we have a mix of accusations, whitewashing, more accusations, more apologism, and no rhyme or rhytm to the section at all. It is hard to read and basically does not give the information in a clear format.

Like I also said earlier, it has some pretty weird juxtapositions, too, with the top prize going to this one: " In May 2006 a Moldovan police officer was arrested in Transnistria for his role in a drug operation. The government of Ukraine, which had long been seen as assisting in this illegal trade [...]" ... WTF?! - Mauco 04:17, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

MarkStreet

This is a user who wants to just remove everything. He sort of has a point (the part that all the main crimes in the USA are not mentioned on the USA page) but it is a very extreme point and I have explained to him why we have to mention the issues in Transnistria. I think that I have convinced him. Anyway, some of the comments and some of the replies are interesting nevertheless -

From Talk:Transnistria:

I don't think it should be on Moldova's page or Transniestria's page. It is akin to asking for a big crack cocaine section to being put on the USA page. It's not fair representation of the respective countries ans purely represents mud slinging. For example the claims of Gun smuggling were today wiped out when President Putindent his generals in to check. They reported that everything was stillthere and accounted for in the arms dumps. So that section needs to be changed too. see ::: http://www.tiraspoltimes.com ::: for full details MarkStreet oct 11th 2006

It can be mentioned. Some other country pages do it. This is from Guatemala: "However, corruption is still rampant at all levels of government. A huge cache of National Police files discovered in December 2005 revealed methods of public security officials to quell unrest of citizens during the Civil War." - Pernambuco 22:25, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Right or wrong, it is a big part of how the world currently sees Transnistria. Do not omit it, just deal with it fairly, truthfully and adhere to Wikipedia NPOV. - Mauco 23:53, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

The EU has given TD a clean bill of health for its border controls just yesterday, see Tiraspoltimes.com. . It is time to delete this historical item. Lets remember even the great USA cannot control its Mexican border. Every border has leakage so the section is redundant and misleading. MarkStreet Oct 19 2006

The UN has now added its voice to state that there is no evidence to back the weapons smuggling claim. This surely is the end of this propaganda based slur. Time to delete this section MarkStreet oct 18

Mikka says...

From Talk:Transnistria:

I have to oppose to the deletion of this section. However it must be rewritten along the lines that it was a massive campaign of defamation of the separatists, nothing was confirmed and even EU cleared the accusations. And it must be moved into the History of Transnistria.

(From Mauco: I think Mikka thinks it is history but as long as there is still EUBAM then it is probably a current affair. I personally don't agree that it should be moved out of the main article. I just think it should be rewritten - Mauco 04:18, 24 October 2006 (UTC) ).

New developments

1. EUBAM, now nearly a year on the border. This shows a track record and some results which we are currently underreporting (actually, not mentioned at all with regards to their findings).

2. Chicken smuggling. Sounds funny, but it is important enought for OSCE to make it the focus of a press conference (in June) and EUBAM to dwell on it at length in a press release and press conference this month (October).

3. UNDP report. Released August, after a year of weapons research on both sides (Moldova and Transdniester). Already mentioned.

4. Arms inspectors. February 2006. Not mentioned at all.

5. OSCE criticism of lack of weapons inspection and Russian reluctance. October. Not mentioned at all.

6. Russian audit of weapons. Results. Not mentioned at all.

7. OSCE statement on weapons smuggling. Not mentioned at all.

Moreover, all of this should be put in context. Right now, the context is in shambles. It leaves the reader with a headache and a lack of understanding. We talk about a police officer caught for drugs. I was the one who introduced that sentence, but the way it sits in the article right now, it is crap. It sounds like tit-for-tat. In my opinion, the current section is a mess. A lot of he-said, she-said ping pong.

I am probably missing a few points, but since we are basically sandboxing here, at least we can get started with the above. We can even mention some of the Nantoi claims, too, or the Voronin $2 billion accusation. The idea is not to whitewash Transnistria but to make an article section that everyone will feel is objective and represents the different views in an accurate way.

Objective

Certainly if you were to write an encyclopia entry, you would take the available information, use most of it, focus on the key points first, omit unimportant tertiary details, and edit it from the top down with the key messages in the first few sentences and then details as the text proceeds.

I am sure that we can do that, AND cover the various views, AND keep it NPOV, and at the same time make sure that we don't delete too much of the existing information while we go about our work of organizating it into a coherent and usefull set of paragraphs. - Mauco 04:17, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Mikka's opinion that this is history should be kept in mind, too, as we edit. Like I said, I don't agree with him. However, we must keep the dates in mind. A credible source from 2005 or 2006 is obviously much more relevant to the article than something from 1998 or 2003, for instance. The older a source, the easier we can ignore it, especially if there has been no follow-up claims of a similar nature and no new developments, proven incidents or evidence in the meantime. - Mauco 04:34, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

It is kind of like saying "this kid is up to no good, he doesn't have any parents to look after him, he is probably robbing and stealing." But then, as the time goes by, and the grows up, and nothing happens, we can look bad and say "our concern was justified, but fortunately, in the past 3 or 4 years, nothing happened. He didn't go bad, we didn't catch him stealing, and he didn't go to jail. All in all, he is turning out better than we expected." If that is the case, surely we'll give the former kid, now a young man, some credit or recognition for having proved our worst expectations wrong, and for not messing up the neighborhood. - Mauco 04:36, 24 October 2006 (UTC)