Socor: Russia Seeks to Block Moldovan Political System through Transnistria

Vladimir Socor, an analyst at the Jamestown Foundation, believes it is unfair that in the current circumstances, when Moldova is striving to become an EU member, Russia retains the mediator status in the “5+2” negotiation format, where the West is assigned only a simple role of an observer. Chisinau, as well as its international partners, should forget the “5+2” format and exclude Russia from all processes of internal political settlement in Moldova. He said this on 15 April in the program “New Week with Anatolie Golea” on TV8. In his opinion, the “5+2” format should be “forgotten and buried” despite the statements about the need to revive it. Initially, Western countries are in an “inferior role” in it compared to Russia and Ukraine, which are mediators. This is unacceptable amid Moldova’s European integration, Socor notes. Today, Transnistria remains the latest Russian project using which Russia, through the rhetoric of “special status”, seeks to disrupt the state of affairs in the country, in this case in Moldova, and to block various political processes. “Special status is a specifically Russian project to disorganize some states of the former USSR. Russia had a special status project for Karabakh within Azerbaijan. Russia had two special status projects for the so-called Donetsk People’s Republic and the so-called Luhansk People’s Republic. As we know, they failed. Transnistria is the last remaining project of special status, it has no right to exist, because Russia’s goal in promoting this special status is to destroy the Moldovan state from within, to block the political system of Moldova through Transnistria,” the political scientist shared his opinion. According to him, Russia as a guarantor of any negotiations in Moldova and Euro-integration are incompatible things, they just “collide with each other”. Moscow should be distanced from making any decisions directly affecting the situation in Moldova. Socor added that there are chances to find a compromise in conditions when the Tiraspol “elites” are extremely interested in the European Union, as more than 70 per cent of their trade in the region goes to European countries.