Has Kyiv Changed Its Moldova-related Plans?

Ukraine has changed its mind about sending the well-known Oleksiy Danilov as ambassador to Moldova. Now this position is being offered to someone with a completely different background, which may indicate a certain change of Kyiv’s approaches in Moldovan-Ukrainian relations

Anton ŠVEC, RTA: Just recently, it became known that Ukraine had reconsidered the decision to appoint the former secretary of the National Security and Defense Council, Oleksiy Danilov, as its ambassador to Chisinau. Moreover, the motive for “changing the horse in mid-stream” was quite unusual: it is said that this candidate for the diplomatic post allegedly “is no longer in touch”. Meanwhile, the post of the head of the Ukrainian diplomatic mission has been virtually vacant since March 2024, when the previous ambassador, Marko Shevchenko, left Moldova. It is rumored that Paun Rohovei may now succeed him. Unlike Danilov, this appointment of a career diplomat fluent in Romanian and with a specialized historical education looks absolutely logical. Rohovei is a Ukrainian from Chernivtsi, i.e. ethnic Romanian, who has impressive diplomatic experience in our region. In total, he worked for more than 15 years at the Ukrainian Embassy in Romania, where he reached the position of Charge d’Affaires (i.e. the second person in the diplomatic mission), and more than 5 years in Moldova. During this five-year period, he acquired a solid reputation and contacts with the central leadership of the country, as well as with the administration on the left bank of the Dniester, which were further expanded after his appointment as Ukraine’s special representative in the Transnistrian settlement. He currently holds this position within the Ukrainian foreign ministry. Over the past few years, Rohovei has regularly visited Chisinau (and Tiraspol a couple of times), to hold numerous meetings with the premier, members of parliament, the deputy prime minister for reintegration and ministers on numerous occasions. This decision by Kyiv can be regarded both as recognition of the merits of a particular official and as a certain change of reference points in the dialogue with Chisinau, a shift to diplomatic work and rhetoric. This appointment can guarantee not only the maintenance of very close and friendly Moldovan-Ukrainian relations, but also the active involvement of Ukrainian diplomacy in the negotiation process, including on the Transnistrian issue. Apparently, Kyiv no longer excludes dialogue methods of settlement of both the Moldova-Transnistria problem and the Russian-Ukrainian conflict itself. And these tasks may require a career diplomat who enjoys general trust and has connections built up over the years. Oleksiy Danilov’s role would be completely different - coordinating the activities of the security services, using Moldova as a logistical corridor for supplies, including military ones, to Ukraine and as a springboard to counter the Kremlin, a factor in swaying the situation around the Russian military presence on the Dniester and pressurizing our leadership if necessary. Most likely, the issue of forced return of Ukrainian refugees in Moldova to their homeland, especially men of conscription age, would be considered. All this would be done with strict subordination, maximum defiant rhetoric and systematic provocations similar to those of 2022 and 2023 in the Transnistrian region. Even at the time of the appointment, RTA experts wrote that Chisinau was hardly happy about the prospect of such an ambiguous character joining the diplomatic corps. It can be assumed that informal signals were sent to Kyiv, which delayed the moment of his assumption of office. On the other hand, Oleksiy Danilov himself was probably not eager to go to Moldova, where he would look like a “bull in a china shop”. In fact, our authorities are doing a good job of ruining Moldovan-Russian relations and aggravating the situation around Transnistria on their own (without shouts from Kyiv). Obviously, the totality of these factors has forced Kyiv to adjust its line. Having sent Paun Rohovei to our direction, he can speak from constructive positions with the priority of political methods of eliminating contradictions. Of course, the decision can still be changed in case of a negative scenario of the gas and energy crisis between Chisinau and Tiraspol. But even in this case, it seems that Paun Rohovei’s diplomatic skills, given the certain dependence of all parties on the generation and transport of electricity from the MoldGRES, can work in favor of all interested parties. The new Ukrainian ambassador will assume his post at a highly complex but interesting moment for diplomacy, a period of searching for a wide-ranging deal with many players and hard-to-calculate variables. The duration and results of this search will largely be determined by the diplomatic capacity of all those involved, including Rohovei, in his current position or in the new one.