The arrival of US military equipment in Moldova is causing extra complications for conflict resolution in Transnistria, Alexey Zaitsev, the deputy director of the Russian foreign ministry's Information and Press Department, said on Thursday
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 30th September, 2021) The arrival of US military equipment in Moldova is causing extra complications for conflict resolution in Transnistria, Alexey Zaitsev, the deputy director of the Russian foreign ministry's Information and Press Department, said on Thursday.
"On September 26, a consignment of US military equipment worth $5 million arrived in Moldova. The goal is to increase the potential of the armed forces of the Republic of Moldova and their interoperability for participation in international peacekeeping operations. According to media reports, the consignment contains small arms, communications, light artillery systems and armored vehicles. Several more similar supplies were announced to be on the way from the United States by the end of the year," Zaitsev said at a briefing.
According to the official, these steps by the West destabilize the situation in the region and hinder the process of the Transnistrian conflict resolution.
"We believe that such steps, which fit into the common line of Washington and Brussels on drawing Moldova into Euro-Atlantic structures, are unlikely to help strengthen confidence between the banks of the Dniester river, further complicating the already stalled process of Transnistrian resolution," he said.
A resolution between Chisinau and Tiraspol is being negotiated within the so-called 5+2 format, wherein Russia, Ukraine and the OSCE act as mediators, and the European Union and the United States as observers. In October 2019, a 5+2 negotiation was held in Bratislava however, no final document was agreed upon and signed. No new rounds took place during 2020.
Transnistria, with Russians and Ukrainians as 60% of the population, sought to secede from Moldova even before the collapse of the Soviet Union, fearing that Moldova would join Romania on a wave of nationalism. In 1992, after an unsuccessful attempt by the Moldovan authorities to resolve the problem by force, Transnistria became a territory virtually outside the control of Chisinau.
