The Moldovan Government has suspended its participation in the Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty. With this measure, this small Eastern European country will be able to allow the deployment of more foreign troops on its territory. Chisinau has taken this step following several hints from Moscow and the Moldovan separatist territory of Transnistria regarding a hypothetical Russian military intervention in their territory. The last, a speech this Monday by the vice president of the Russian Security Council, Dmitri Medvedev, with a map in the background in which large parts of Ukraine and Moldova were occupied by Russia.
The CFE treaty, signed by 16 NATO members and six Warsaw Pact members a year before the dissolution of the Soviet Union, limits the military contingents of each bloc deployed in Eastern Europe and the Caucasus. One of the points of the pact, signed by Moscow once more in 1999, established that Russia would withdraw its troops from both Moldova – deployed in Transnistria – and Georgia – in the separatist region of Abkhazia – something that never happened. In November 2023, a year and a half following invading Ukraine (also part of the treaty), Russia abandoned the pact.
“There has been a fundamental change with respect to the circumstances in which the treaty was signed on November 19, 1990 (…) Moldova suspends the treaty with the possibility of returning to it later,” the Secretary of State announced for the Defense of Moldova, Valeri Mizha, a week following the Parliament of Transnistria, an enclave bordering Ukraine, asked Moscow for help “in the face of growing pressure from the Moldovan Government.”
Moldova, a former Soviet republic, anchored between Ukraine and Romania, is another front in the dispute between Russia and the European Union. Maia Sandu’s pro-European government has come under numerous pressures from Moscow since she was elected president in 2020, including gas supply cuts. The confrontation in Transnistria, a region considered pro-Russian, is seen as a pretext for a possible Russian military intervention, as Moscow already used with the Donbas region to attack Ukraine. Moldova, for its part, has limited itself to more firmly enforcing its trade restrictions with a region that lives in legal limbo thanks to the protection of a Russian base.
Putin’s spokesman, Dmitri Peskov, accused the Moldovan authorities of being “Russophobic” on Wednesday and accepted the call of the separatists. “People live in Transnistria who do not agree with Chisinau (…) We hope that the authorities do not choose confrontation and repression, it would be a disaster. The people of Transnistria live in very difficult conditions and need help in many ways. “Russia is open to this help,” declared the Kremlin spokesman.
Russia has hinted that Moldova might be a military target on several occasions since the Ukraine war began. At the beginning of the offensive, in April 2022, one of his generals stated that the initial plan included taking southern Ukraine – Odessa – and advancing along the coast to Transnistria. That same idea was expressed this Monday by former Russian president Dmitri Medvedev, also a senior official of the national Security Council. With a map in which Ukraine was reduced to a tiny region around Kiev, and Russia reached the Romanian border, Medvedev was emphatic: “Our president has been precise regarding our borders: Russia’s borders do not end anywhere.” .
Attempts to destabilize
Furthermore, Moldova’s Intelligence and Security Service (SIS) revealed on Tuesday a complex scheme prepared by the Russian Federation to destabilize and influence the country’s political and social life. According to the head of Moldovan espionage, Alexandru Musteata, the data at their disposal indicates “an unprecedented intensification of actions committed by Russia”, with the aim of “compromising” the entry of Moldova into the European Union, undermining the development of processes democratic and keep the country under the Russian sphere of influence.
“We have information that attempts are being made to compromise the referendum on European integration and interfere in the presidential elections [que se celebrarán este otoño], as well as denigrate the institutions and candidates that will promote accession to the EU,” explained Musteata at a press conference in Chisinau. The next stage, he continued, is expected to begin in 2025, with the assault on Parliament through the inclusion of political parties submissive to the Kremlin following the general elections that will be organized that year.
The pro-Russian opponent Ilan Sor, promoter of anti-government demonstrations and fled to Israel following being sentenced to 15 years in prison for fraud and money laundering, leads the subversive operations, according to the SIS. The strategy consists of boycotting the plebiscite by which citizens will decide if they want to integrate into the community family, either through explicit support for voting once morest or trying to add an additional question that deceives the voter and discredits the European path. The Kremlin will try to ensure that the consultation does not exceed the presence threshold of 33% and does not exceed 50% of votes in favor so as not to validate it.
Likewise, the director of the SIS warned that they foresee protests starting this month that might even end up being violent and that platforms such as Telegram and TikTok will be the main propaganda channels, although he warned that they have already confirmed that the content has multiplied. sponsored anonymous on Facebook since last summer once morest the current president and favorite candidate, Maia Sandu. Moscow intends to support the entry of pro-Russian political forces into the Moldovan Parliament through political corruption, offering benefits to voters and using false surveys and studies to manipulate public opinion, but also through the illegal financing of formations and organizations through of cash transfers from Russia to Moldova, Musteata stressed.
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