Pro-Russian politicians and activists in Moldova's breakaway Transistria region (also known as Trans-Dniester) have asked the Russian parliament to draft a law that would allow their territory to join Russia. In early February EU Enlargement Commissioner Stefan Fule had warned in a speech to the European Parliament that Moldova sovereignty and territorial integrity is being systematically undermined from outside.
A spokeswoman for the regions parliament told Russia’s Itar-Tass news agency that Transistrian authorities have “appealed to the Russian Federation leadership to examine the possibility of extending to Trans-Dniester the legislation, currently under discussion in the State Duma, on granting Russian citizenship and admitting new subjects into Russia".
She was alluding to the bill recently introduced by the Just Russia party, which if passed would make it easier for new territories to join Russia.
Transistria, whose population is made up mostly of Ukrainians and Russians but has a sizeable ethnic Moldovan minority, declared itself independent in 1990, following the breakup of the USSR and the creation of Moldova in 1991. A war followed in 1992. Russian forces have remained in Transistria since 1991.
This new attempt at not just independence but incorporation into Russia comes on the day Russia annexed Crimea following a referendum on March 16 in which 93% of those that turned up to vote said they want the region to join Moscow.
In 2006 the region held a referendum that has not been recognised by either the Moldovan government or the international community. At them time a staggering 97.2% of those that voted said they were in favor of "independence from Moldova and free association with Russia."
Today Moldova's President Nicolae Timofti said that any decision by Moscow to accept Transistria “would be a step in the wrong direction".
On February 6 Fule had told the EP that the “European Union also supports, and will continue to support by all means, Moldova's sovereignty and territorial integrity” and had added that an escalation of tensions between Moldova and the breakaway region “poses a formidable threat.”
Yet again the EU had dangled the carrot of a political association and free trade agreement - like the one that Ukraine’s former president Vyktor Yanukovich refused to sign in November triggering the current crisis.
“We will continue working for the Transnistrian de facto authorities to consider in earnest the substantial benefits the region can gain, if it participates in the future Association Agreement with Moldova,” the Commissioner had said.
But Russia’s Vedomosti newspaper reports that the Transistrian appeal to Russia also warns about a possible further deterioration if Moldova signs an association agreement with the EU.
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