Ministry of Internal Affairs

The headquarters of Moldova's Ministry of Internal Affairs at Bulevardul Ștefan cel Mare 75 is one of the principal Stalinist-era civic buildings on Chișinău's main boulevard, its three-storey facade organised around a central loggia of six arched columns in cream stone, flanked by rusticated pilasters and elaborate cornices. This composition that places it firmly within the neoclassical administrative typology that defined the post-war reconstruction of the boulevard's central section. The MAI building was constructed in the early 1960s as part of the same wave of state institution construction that produced the Government House (1964) and other Soviet ministries along what was then Prospekt Lenina. In front of the building stands a dark granite memorial stele with a figural bas-relief, inscribed "Memorie veșnică colaboratorilor organelor afacerilor interne căzuți la datorie" (eternal memory to those who fell in the line of duty). The Moldovan Ministry of Internal Affairs in its current form was established on 13 September 1990 by Government Decision No. 321, replacing the Soviet militia with a new national police structure following Moldova's declaration of sovereignty.