Mark Tkachuk

He was born in 1966, in Soroca, Moldavian SSR. His father Yevgeny is of Moldovan-Ukrainian origin and his mother Azniv, originating in the Caucasus, of Armenian-Hemshin origin. He graduated from the History Faculty at the State University of Moldova. From 1992 to 1994 he studied at the Academy of Sciences of Russia. According to some sources, during this period he was part of the far-left Confederation of Anarcho-Syndicalists.[2]

At the beginning of 2000 he joined the Party of Communists of the Republic of Moldova. In 2001-2002 he was a Member of the Parliament of the Republic of Moldova, giving up his mandate to become adviser to President Vladimir Voronin in domestic policy, a position he had held until November 2008. During this period he became one of the leaders of the Communist Party, working on the modernization of the party. He is believed to have negotiated the accession of the PCRM to the Party of the European Left. The opposition criticized him for his strong pro-Russian, Moldovenist, anti-European and anti-Romanian position, characterizing him as "Moscow's right hand man".[3]

In 2005 and 2006, VIP Magazine included mark Tkaciuk in the top "most influential Moldovans" at 11 and 6, respectively.[4][5]

After 2009, when the PCRM entered the opposition, Mark Tkaciuk started to support more strongly a party reform.[6] He started to be labelled as the "brain" or the "grey eminence" of the party, as well as "Voronin's child".[7][8][9][10] Together with Voronin, he became a vocal critic of the European Union, supporting the accession of Moldova to the Eurasian Union, stating that Chișinău had streets named after fascist criminals (referring to the streets named by Romanian personalities).On June 7, 2014, Iurie Muntean, Mark Tkaciuk and Grigore Petrenco were expelled from the Executive Committee of the PCRM. “They were expelled due to problems and shortcomings in their work. The party is preparing for parliamentary elections. We assume that it will be a hard struggle, and we must be organized and brisk,” Voronin said . “The question was raised about my expulsion from the Central Committee.[...] I personally don't know the reasons behind this decision. I was not given the opportunity to speak in return,” said Mark Tkachuk. In the same year he announced he was withdrawing from politics.[11][12]

He returned to politics in 2019 when, together with Iurie Muntean, he founded the Collective Action Party – Civic Congress.[13][14][15] He is currently a member of the executive committee of the party.