Armed conflict in Transnistria 1992)
The starting point for the current conflict between Chisinau and Tiraspol was the development in early 1989 by the Supreme Council (SC) of the MSSR of the bills “On the State Language” and “On the Functioning of Languages on the Territory of the MSSR”. It was not Moldovan based on the Cyrillic alphabet that was recognized as the only state language, but Romanian. Russian was assigned only the role of a language of interethnic communication. This decision, accompanied by a noisy campaign of Romanianization of socio-political and cultural life, sharply aggravated the national question and caused an increase in interethnic contradictions in the republic. It was perceived very painfully in the most industrially developed industrial region compared to the rest of Moldova - Transnistria, the majority of whose inhabitants, for historical reasons, were Russian-speaking. Transnistrian deputies represented in the MSSR Supreme Council took the initiative to introduce two state languages, preserve the Cyrillic script and conduct a mandatory referendum on the mentioned bills, but it was rejected by the nationalist majority. As a result, on August 31, 1989, these two documents were adopted, and the date itself was proclaimed a national holiday - Language Day.
Transnistria regarded the actions of Chisinau as a legislative infringement of the equality of citizens of all nationalities living in the MSSR. Mass protests took place in cities across the region.
On such a wave, Pridnestrovian deputies in the Supreme Soviet of the MSSR were forced to initiate consideration of the issue of autonomy of the region as part of a united Moldova, followed by a referendum. Although this issue was included in the agenda of the next session of the MSSR Supreme Council, its discussion was essentially blocked by the efforts of nationalists. At the same time, the Romanian tricolor was declared the state flag of the republic, and its name was changed to SSR Moldova (SSRM). Powerful psychological pressure and physical violence were applied to the Transnistrian group of deputies of the Supreme Council. Nevertheless, the Pridnestrovians continued to actively work in parliament and oppose the growth of nationalist manifestations until the adoption of a declaration of sovereignty by the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on June 23, 1990, which marked the beginning of the process of the republic’s secession from the USSR.
The entire course of such events contributed to the maturation of the idea of creating an independent state in Transnistria. If on June 2, 1990, the first congress of deputies of all levels held in Transnistria spoke only for the autonomous status of the region, then exactly three months later at the second similar congress the creation of the Transnistrian SSR was already proclaimed.
At the same time, there was a process of autonomization in another region of Moldova - Gagauzia, whose population opposed the rising wave of Moldovan-Romanian nationalism, for the proclamation of cultural autonomy. In October 1990, elections to the local Supreme Council were announced in Gagauzia. Chisinau tried to prevent them from taking place by sending in police and volunteers from among the radical nationalists of the Popular Front. Bloodshed was avoided only thanks to the introduction of special forces of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs into the region at the request of the Gagauz leadership. Events in Gagauzia sharply aggravated the internal political situation and accelerated the process of disengagement of Transnistria from the rest of Moldova, which led to the first casualties among the civilian population. On November 2, 1990, near the city of Dubossary, during an operation by the Moldovan police, three Pridnestrovians were killed and sixteen were wounded. On August 27, 1991, the Declaration of Independence of the Republic of Moldova (RM) was adopted in Chisinau. In response to this, the Supreme Council of Transnistria soon proclaims the Transnistrian Moldavian Republic (PMR) and approves the decision to transfer all government agencies Left Bank. On December 1, 1991, presidential elections and a referendum on the independence of the PMR from the Republic of Moldova are held in the region.
Chisinau, having recognized the actions of the Pridnestrovians as illegal and having abandoned political means of resolving the current situation, took the path of forcefully solving problems with Tiraspol. It was then that, to instill terror among the residents of Transnistria, the special services of Moldova and Romania created detachments of militants from among the nationalists. One of the most active among them was the sabotage group “Buzhor”, led by the well-known Ilashku, who and his accomplices “distinguished themselves” for their particular cruelty.
The outbreak of clashes in March 1992 by the summer of that year gradually escalated into a large-scale armed conflict on the banks of the Dniester. The entire arsenal of the Moldovan army was used against Transnistria. In fact, it was a genuine aggression against the region, which led to the death of hundreds of people. The fighting took place in close proximity to military units of the former 14th Army, which was stationed in the Transnistrian region. Its military personnel were subjected to provocations by seizing hostages and weapons. Despite this and numerous appeals from civilians, the 14th Army remained neutral. When the conflict became threatening and its escalation reached its climax, the army command, at the request of Moldovan President M. Snegur, decided to intervene and separate the warring parties in order to put an end to the bloodshed.
As a result, on July 21, 1992, in Moscow, the presidents of Russia and Moldova, in the presence of the head of Transnistria, signed an Agreement on the principles of the peaceful settlement of the armed conflict in the Transnistrian region of the Republic of Moldova.
The growth of centrifugal tendencies in the Soviet Union provoked a conflict around Transnistria on the territory of Moldova near its border with Ukraine. The Transnistria region was the most developed part of the former Moldavian SSR. It is located on the left bank of the Dniester (Left Bank) and is populated in approximately equal proportions by Russians, Ukrainians and Moldovans. After the national-state demarcation in the USSR in the 20s of the XX century. In this part of the former Russian Empire, the Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic was formed, which became part of the Ukrainian SSR. Tiraspol became its capital.
After Romania returned Bessarabia to the Soviet Union in 1940 (see vol. 1 present, ed.), the Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic was united with Bessarabia and transformed into the Moldavian SSR, the capital of which was Chisinau. In Romania and in certain sections of the Moldovan population, the opinion remained that Bessarabia was “torn off” from Romania illegally and that Moldova should therefore sooner or later unite with Romania. At the time of “perestroika,” sentiments in favor of unification revived. The Romanian government did not officially express territorial claims to the USSR.
In 1989, in the wake of the “sovereignization” of the union republics of the USSR, the Supreme Council of the Moldavian SSR adopted a law on the state language, which envisaged the curtailment of the use of the Russian language in the republic and the introduction of the Romanian language, which was recognized as the state language of Moldova. The Russian and Ukrainian population of Moldova reacted sharply to the innovations; the Left Bank became the center of public discontent.
In 1990, the Supreme Council of the Moldavian SSR, where the majority began to be non-communists, invalidated the “Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact” and the related Soviet-German agreements, on the basis of which, as is commonly believed, the USSR achieved the return of Bessarabia. These decisions could be interpreted as indicating the illegality of its transition to Soviet control. Public opinion The Left Bank considered that the government in Chisinau was preparing to raise the issue of unification with Romania.
The non-Moldavian population was confident that in the event of unification with Romania, the Romanian-Moldovan state would (♦) include the territory of the former Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, which was not part of Bessarabia and never belonged to Romania. A movement against unification with Romania arose in Transnistria. Attempts by nationalist circles in Chisinau to speed up integration with Romania exacerbated contradictions between different ethnic groups in Moldova. In the fall of 1990, the “Transnistrian Moldavian Republic” (PMR) was proclaimed in Transnistria with its capital in Tiraspol.
At first, its leadership proposed that Chisinau conclude a federal agreement and transform Moldova into a federal state. After the central government refused to consider this project, the PMR recalled the deputies representing the regions included in it from the Moldovan parliament and began to issue its own laws that contradict the Moldovan constitution. The Moldovan authorities have introduced economic sanctions against the Transnistrian people.
Liberal circles of the USSR in 1990-1991. considered Transnistria a “communist reserve” and did not support its leaders. Since November 1990, Moldovan law enforcement agencies have been trying to regain control over Transnistria with the help of police forces. But the local population resisted these attempts, using methods of “peaceful seizure” of administrative institutions and government facilities. Women were active participants in the protests of the Transnistrian population.
The situation became more tense when, at the end of 1991, the Supreme Council of Moldova adopted the Declaration of Independence. The leadership of Transnistria proclaimed the “independence” of the PMR. Moldova did not recognize it and began to lean towards the need to restore the integrity of the republic by force. At the same time, the Moldavian army did not exist, the government had only police forces at its disposal, and in Transnistria there already existed militia groups (“guards”) numbering about 10 thousand people. In Moldova, combat units of “volunteers” also began to form.
The situation was complicated by the presence of the 14th Soviet Army in Transnistria. Army units could be drawn into the conflict, since a significant part of the army's officer corps consisted of natives of Transnistria and people who had settled there for a long time. The military personnel were officers Soviet army, citizens of Moldova and at the same time residents of the PMR. The Moldovan authorities, heads of administrative bodies of Transnistria and Transnistrian “guardsmen” laid claim to the army equipment.
On March 1, 1992, Moldovan militants attacked one of the military units of the former Soviet army on the right bank of the Dniester in order to seize weapons. With this skirmish the military stage of the conflict began. On March 17, the Moldovan parliament adopted a law on the creation of the armed forces. On March 28, a state of emergency was declared in the country. The fighting took place between units of the newly formed national army of Moldova and Moldovan-Romanian volunteers, on the one hand, and Transnistrian “guards” and units of the 14th Russian army based in Transnistria, on the other. A particularly tense situation developed in the city of Bendery, the majority of whose residents were in favor of joining the PMR, although the city is located on the right bank of the Dniester.
Without clear orders from the command, the leadership of the 14th Army hesitated, unwilling to accept responsibility for the use of force. The Russian leadership found itself in a delicate position in connection with the Transnistrian conflict. There were many supporters of Transnistria's independence in society. There were anti-Moldovan sentiments in Ukraine. A concentration of Russian-Ukrainian volunteer fighters began in Transnistria. On the Moldovan side, along with units of the regular Moldovan army, units of Moldovan-Romanian “volunteers” also began to converge on the administrative borders of Transnistria.
In April 1992, Russian President B.N. Yeltsin risked issuing a decree transferring the 14th Soviet Army under Russian jurisdiction. The next day, the officers' meeting of the 14th Army decided to put an end to the bloodshed in Transnistria, declaring that if provocations were not stopped by April 12, 1992 and negotiations to resolve the conflict did not begin, then the Russian army units would begin to “act according to the situation.” This was an ultimatum from the army command to the warring parties.
Political contacts between Tiraspol and Chisinau have resumed. However, in Chisinau the “war party” prevailed. On June 19, 1992, additional units of the Moldovan army and “volunteers” were introduced into the city of Bendery. The fighting became more fierce. Many civilians died. 70 thousand refugees left the Bender region. Transnistrian formations, using the equipment of the 14th Army, were able to stop the advance of the Moldovan troops. The leadership of the armed forces of Moldova began to ask for reinforcements.
In such a situation, the President of Russia appointed General A.I. Lebed as commander of the 14th Army. The new commander immediately demanded to stop attempts to resolve the Transnistrian issue by force, declaring the readiness of the army units entrusted to him, if necessary, to transfer hostilities to the territory of Right Bank Moldova. It was believed that General A.I. Lebed acted at his own discretion, but later it became known that his demarche was secretly sanctioned by Moscow. A.I. Lebed gave the order to the forces of the 14th Army to push the Moldovan and Transnistrian formations away from their line of contact and to place the Russian contingent in the resulting corridor. An operation was carried out to separate the troops. The conflict was frozen.
On July 21, 1992, negotiations were held in Moscow, as a result of which it was possible to sign a Russian-Moldavian agreement on the principles of a peaceful settlement. Tripartite peace-(♦)creative forces of representatives of the two Moldovan parties and Russia were created. On the administrative border of Transnistria and Moldova, a security belt 220 km long and 10-20 km wide was formed on both sides of the Dniester. The leadership of the peacekeeping forces was entrusted to the tripartite settlement commission.
Moscow's support for the Transnistrian side complicated the implementation of plans for the unification of Moldova with Romania. But the ceasefire did not resolve any of the issues that started the conflict. The presence of the 14th Army in the region stabilized the situation, but also complicated the settlement. The Transnistrian leadership, feeling under the protection of the Russian military, persisted in rejecting Chisinau’s compromise proposals. The influence that A.I. Lebed acquired in Transnistria caused his conflict with the leadership of the unrecognized republic. In 1995, General A.I. Lebed was recalled from Transnistria.
The Constitution of Moldova, adopted in 1994, secured the status of autonomy for Transnistria. But this did not satisfy the Transnistrians, who insisted on more serious guarantees of their right not to join a union with Romania under any circumstances. At the beginning of 1997, with the mediation of Russia, negotiations began between Chisinau and Tiraspol on a final settlement of the situation. They ended on May 8, 1997 with the signing in Moscow of a memorandum on the foundations for normalizing relations between the Republic of Moldova and the Transnistrian Republic. The parties were able to reach a compromise - they agreed to build relations within the framework of a common state, within the borders of the Moldavian SSR as of January 1990. However, a final settlement of the conflict did not occur.
The withdrawal from Transnistria of units of the former 14th Army and its military equipment, according to the decisions of the OSCE summit in Istanbul in 1999, was supposed to be completed before 2001. But a final agreement on this issue could not be reached due to the position of Transnistria. On the territory of the latter there remains a large number of weapons of the former 14th Russian Army, the possession of which Tiraspol claims. Moscow and Chisinau are against this. The stay of Russian troops in Transnistria was extended until 2003.
The conflict between national groups with different orientations in Moldova was brewing even before the collapse of the USSR. The primary reason for this situation was that the Popular Front of Moldova (PFM), formed in May 1989, playing on the national feelings of the Moldovan people, managed to get its supporters into the Supreme Council of the MSSR during the election process.
Using methods of threats and intimidation of deputies of Moldovan nationality, as well as methods of physical influence on deputies of other nationalities, the NFM gave the form of law to all the main fundamental provisions of its program, adopted at the First Congress of the Popular Front of Moldova, and formed the leadership of the republic on a mono-national basis.
Thus, the main content of the emerging ethnic conflict was the desire of the ideologists and creators of the ethnonational movement, namely the NFM, to change in order to ensure a more fair, from their point of view, consideration of the national interests of the Moldovan people (only Moldovans!). Statements by some Moldovan leaders were aimed at separating nationalities that did not belong to the majority. All this ultimately served as a detonator for ethnic unrest.
However, no one in the Popular Front of Moldova (PFM) was going to limit itself only to the lands “between the Prut and the Dniester.” The ideology of the NFM is a direct heir to the ideology of legionnaires that guided the Romanian occupation authorities in 1941-1944. It is not for nothing that the organ of the Union of Writers of Moldova (as in other union republics of the USSR, it was the creative intelligentsia, and especially the writers, who led the sharply anti-Soviet and anti-Russian movements, forming the ideology of the Popular Fronts), the newspaper "Glasul" (June 9-14, 1990) published a huge article dedicated to the memory of Antonescu, under the expressive title “Requiem for an Innocent” (“Recviem pentru un invins”).
The “laundering” of Antonescu’s name and the return to the doctrine of Transnistria immediately gave a specific shade to the Romanianism of the Popular Front, which led to the replacement of the traditional Cyrillic alphabet for the Moldovan language with the Latin alphabet, and the glotonym (name of the language) and ethnonym (name of the people), respectively, with “Romanian”, "Romanians". It became clear that we're talking about about the continuation of the occupation policy of 1941-1944, one of the “pillars” of which was precisely the denial of the very existence of the “Moldavian” people. And since the chairman of the “National Council of Transnistrian Romanians”, created in December 1942, N. Smokina, noted the development of “feelings of Moldovan ethnic origin” among the left-bank Moldovans, an entire program was developed to eradicate the latter. An organic part of it was the resettlement of Romanians from Southern Dobrudzha across the Dniester and, accordingly, the eviction of Russians and Ukrainians towards the Bug. On February 26, 1942, Antonescu said: “Transnistria will become Romanian territory, we will make it Romanian and evict all foreigners.”
Let me remind you that in July 1941, Ion Antonescu announced his intention to expel not only Jews, but also the “Ukrainian element” from Bessarabia and Bukovina. A policy was pursued of total ethnic cleansing of Romania from foreign populations, primarily Bessarabia and Bukovina, and then Transnistria with the aim of Romanianization and colonization of these territories. Jews, as the most vulnerable population in occupied Europe, were the first to fall into this meat grinder. And if not for the victory of the Red Army in that bloody massacre, then...
On August 19, 1941, Antonescu signed a decree on the creation of an effective administration in the territory between the Dniester and the Bug. The entire territory of Moldova and part of Ukraine was reduced to three governorates: Bessarabia, Bukovina and Transnistria. The first two were directly part of Greater Romania.
On August 30, 1941, in Bendery, the German and Romanian command signed an agreement, which began the shameful countdown of the ethnic cleansing of the population of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina. Attached to it was a secret supplement in which the Romanian intelligence services and the Gestapo department under the leadership of Eichmann “decided” on the future fate of the Jews. There, in particular, it was said that the Jews of Transnistria would after some time be handed over to the Germans for deportation to the General Government. The Nazis needed a delay to build extermination camps.
It seems that it is not difficult to understand what kind of reaction among the Russians, Ukrainians, and Bulgarians of Transnistria was aroused by the very first attempts to glorify Antonescu, which declared themselves on the right bank of the Dniester. However, not only they, but also the Moldovans expressed indignation, and very violently. After all, according to the main legend of Romanian nationalism, they are just, at best, a subethnic group of Romanians, while the latter, in this doctrine, trace their genealogy through the Roman legions directly to the Capitoline She-wolf, the famous sculpture of which has long adorned Bucharest. And although the Roman legions for the most part did not consist of Italics, but were a motley amalgam of all ethnic groups great empire, in this case this is not so important, because the “she-wolf” here personifies primarily the Western Latin vector of political and cultural aspirations as such, in its sharp opposition to the East Slavic vector. It is not for nothing that the “Roman guest”, who has now graced Chisinau, found refuge on the former Kievskaya Street, significantly renamed the street on August 31 - the day of the adoption of the Law on Language, which replaced Moldovan with Romanian and translated it into the Latin script.
The development of an ethnic conflict into an interstate conflict between Moldova and the self-proclaimed and self-organizing state of the PMR was accompanied by an increase in the organization of both sides, in particular the replacement of agitation with official propaganda regulated by the state, the transition from paramilitary volunteer formations to regular military formations.
“Pro-Romanian” sentiments in Moldova were and are being fueled in every possible way by the speeches of certain political forces in Romania itself, seeking to create “Romania Mare” (“Greater Romania”). After the collapse of the Union, official Bucharest intensified its policy of annexing Bessarabia.
The threat of “Romanianization” was one of the reasons for the armed conflict in Transnistria. The “nationalization” of the Moldovan language, along with extremist pressure from unionists advocating the unification of Moldova with Romania, was the main reason for the disintegration processes in the Republic.
Opposing forces:
- on the one hand, the national movement of Moldovans; on the Moldovan side, along with military formations, there were the Volunteer League (approximately 4,000 people) and police units;
- on the other hand, the Russian, Ukrainian and Moldavian population living on the left bank of the Dniester, the Gagauz (152,000 people) Christians of the Turkic people, the “Guard of the Transnistrian Republic”, as well as Cossack units, acted on the side of the PMR.
- In addition to the opposing forces of Moldova and Transnistria, a “third force” existed and acted, trying to disrupt the stabilization process in the region through sabotage actions.
The first clashes in Transnistria did not initially cost any lives. However, intransigence and refusal to seek compromises subsequently turned into a tragedy.
Moldova. Area 337 thousand square meters. km, Population 4.352 million people, of which 65% are Moldovans, 13% Russians, 14% Ukrainians. The length of the border with Ukraine is 939 km, of which 270 km are in the PMR.
The military-political situation in Moldova is of concern primarily in Ukraine, which has a direct border with Transnistria.
In 1995-1996 alone, the number of Russians in Moldova increased 10 times - local residents are actively accepting Russian citizenship. Over the course of three years, 30 thousand people have done this, and about 60 thousand, according to preliminary data, intend to receive it. Moreover, among them are not only Russians, but also Ukrainians, Gagauz, Jews, Moldovans - according to the “fifth point”, the law on citizenship of the Russian Federation does not limit admission.
In Chisinau they say that the conductors of Sovietization and Russification of the right, Bessarabian bank were the Transnistrian Moldovans, whose language was saturated with Russian words.
The overwhelming number of Moldovan industrial enterprises were subordinate to the Union ministries in Moscow. Huge factories, many of which belonged to the military-industrial complex, were a kind of extraterritorial zones to which republican power did not extend.
When Moldova declared its sovereignty in the summer of 1990, the leaders of Transnistria immediately declared their disagreement with it and announced the creation of the Transnistrian Soviet Socialist Republic. Events developed rapidly and uncontrollably. The reason for the events was speeches (including by the leaders of the republic) for the annexation of Moldova to Romania.
After this, the process of forming new authorities on the Right Bank and Left Bank proceeded almost in parallel with a slight advance in favor of Chisinau.
Linguistic: a prerequisite for conflict. In Moldova, as in other republics of the former Union, one of the primary tasks of domestic policy was a radical change in the language situation in all areas and in a short time.
Moreover, the Law “On the Functioning of Languages” on the territory of the Moldavian SSR proclaimed Romanian state and returned the Romanian alphabet. This law, adopted on August 31, 1989 - even before the collapse of the USSR, was used immediately. The mechanism of linguistic discrimination has worked like a detonator, the social and political consequences of which are enormous.
The outwardly balanced text of the law could not be misleading and in fact infringed on the interests of the Russian-speaking population. While Moldovans spoke both Moldovan and Russian, many Ukrainians and Russians who moved here have a poor command of the Moldovan language. Therefore, the Russian-speaking population of Moldova viewed the law as a threat to their existence. The law made it easier for the leadership of Transnistria to decide to secede from Moldova.
By the way, the overwhelming majority of the population supported this project and advocated for both state languages, but still with a predominant role for Russian. After all, it is practically the language of interethnic communication.
The CSCE mission later viewed the law as one of the causes of the conflict. From the point of view of ensuring human rights and creating preconditions for resolving the conflict, it was necessary to revise the law.
The mechanism of confrontation has been launched: there is always a reason. But one of its ominous features is not fully taken into account: the conflict gets out of people’s control and begins to develop according to its own monstrous scenario, in which everyone without exception, guilty and innocent, goes through torment and suffering. There are no winners - only losers. Are we able to bring meaning and clarity to the understanding of those preconditions that inevitably lead to an explosion?
In our attitude towards the Moldovan problems there is something of the naivety and self-deception of a person who is confident in his choice and does not suspect that he is being manipulated, imposing exactly such a choice. The MNF successfully sowed the wind - the people reaped the storm.
The population of Moldova did not participate in the referendum on March 17, 1991 on the preservation of the USSR. At the stage of the revolutionary struggle, the NFM gained the sympathy and support of broad sections of the population and liberal-minded intelligentsia, which, in conditions of general political unrest, allowed the leaders of the movement to seize power within the borders of Moldova.
After seizing power, the NFM began its legislative activities: on April 27, 1990, the Parliament of the Republic of Moldova passed the Law "On State flag"" ("tricolor" was introduced - the blue-yellow-red flag of the Romanian state with the addition of an eagle with a bull's head), and on November 3 ""O State emblem"". The Romanian national anthem, a revolutionary song from 1848, was declared the anthem of Moldova. The government set a course for unification with Romania. Chisinau has become similar to Munich during the Nazi beer hall putsch. People's deputies were beaten, the families of departing Jews were beaten. The newspaper "Youth of Moldova" was destroyed, journalists were taken hostage, and the editorial office of the newspaper "Evening Chisinau" was set on fire.
Nationalists broke down doors, broke into private houses, beat people, and robbed. In the center of the city, Dima Matyushin was beaten to death, unable to answer a question asked in Romanian. And all this despite the complete inaction of the police. This was in 1989.
The Popular Front forcibly loaded buses with residents of the surrounding villages and brought them to the city to demonstrate “national unity”, doping them with vodka, promising “city apartments with furniture” when the “occupiers” were driven out. The Popular Front seized power in the republic completely. The dismissal of foreign speakers began. In fact, the order of Governor C. Voiculescu dated November 15, 1941 for the governorate of “Bessarabia” was carried out: “... Civil servants are prohibited from speaking in a foreign language during service... Students are prohibited from speaking in a foreign language, with the exception of languages taught in the lyceum. Violation is punishable by prison imprisonment for up to two years."
In fact, at the highest state level, the leaders of Moldova proclaimed the linguistic and ethnic unification of “Romanian” and “Moldavian” both languages and their own nation, which, starting in the mid-eighties, decided that it was “Romanian”. The Transnistrian people, including Transnistrians of Moldovan origin, did not want to be called “Romanians” or consider their language (based on the Cyrillic alphabet) to be “Romanian”. The opposite side stubbornly continued to consider themselves Romanians, and having declared war on the Pridnestrovians, they armed their soldiers with Romanian weapons, uniforms with Romanian stripes, recognizing the Romanian flag and the anthem “Wake up, Romanians” as their own state symbols. Thus, as during the Second World War, the Transnistrian people fought the Romanians. The violent collapse of Moldova occurred as a consequence of the emergence of a new Romanian state - the Republic of Moldova, which proclaimed a course towards unification with the “motherland” Romania, considering that Transnistria is the same “Romanian” land as Bessarabia. In response to adequate self-defense measures on the part of the Transnistrian people, Moldova launched a military campaign and attempted to occupy Transnistria.
Over the past 15 years, Moldova and Transnistria have been developing as two independent and completely different states. The Transnistrian people are a modern and already established community, separate from the Republic of Moldova. The Transnistrian people are drawn to their historical bonds of brotherhood with the neighboring Slavic peoples - Ukrainians and Russians. However, it does not at all set as its main goal reunification with neighboring states, having repeatedly confirmed the desire for independence and true sovereignty during referendums.
Moldova, on the contrary, at the highest level, declared its strategic goal to become part of Romania. Let me remind you that the Romanians from Moldova, who carried out ethnic cleansing on the territory of Transnistria, especially cruelly tortured the Transnistrian Moldovans, considering them “traitors to the Romanian people.” An expert who does not observe the ethnic component in a given conflict is either incompetent or acts in the interests of only one of the parties. This position of American and European diplomats in no way contributes to the resolution of the conflict or full-fledged dialogue equal sides, which in the negotiation process in all main documents indicate Moldova and Transnistria.
Birth of the Republic of Moldova. The starting point for the subsequent events of modern history is considered to be the day of June 5, 1990, when the Supreme Council of the Moldavian SSR established a new name for the state - the Republic of Moldova. On June 5, 1990, the First Congress of Deputies of Transnistria was declared illegal. He is accused of creating parallel structures of power. There were threats of sanctions against its organizers.
On June 23, 1990, the Armed Forces of Moldova adopted the Declaration of Sovereignty, which removed it from the USSR. And then the Conclusion of the Commission of the Supreme Soviet of the SSR of Moldova appeared on the denunciation of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, as a result of which the “illegal proclamation of the Moldavian SSR on August 2, 1940” became possible. Bessarabia was declared occupied Romanian lands that had to be returned. Thus, the state self-liquidated.
At the same time, the law on Moldovan citizenship came into force. Former communist party leader Mircea Snegur led the national movement and became chairman of the Supreme Council.
On June 28, 1990, it was adopted as No. 41 Conclusion of the commission of the Supreme Soviet of the SSR of Moldova on the political and legal assessment of the Soviet-German non-aggression treaty and the additional secret protocol of August 23, 1939, as well as their consequences for Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina.
The Conclusion emphasized the “illegal proclamation of the Moldavian SSR on August 2, 1940, which was an act of dismemberment of Bessarabia and Bukovina. The transfer of Northern Bukovina and the districts of Khotyn, Izmail and Chetatya Albe to the jurisdiction of the Ukrainian SSR contradicted the historical truth and ethnic reality of that time." (Historically, the reality is that in 1924 the Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic was formed on the territory of the Ukrainian SSR, although Moldovans made up only 30% of its population).
Then, in accordance with this logic, the Supreme Soviet of the SSR Moldova thereby freed itself from the right of the supreme body of the sovereign state of the SSR Moldova. And the very existence of such a state, according to the logic of the Conclusion, is excluded, since its territories are recognized as the territory of Romania, occupied since 1940 by the Soviet Union.
Because of this, the Second Extraordinary Congress of People's Deputies of all levels of the Transnistrian region on September 2, 1990, gave a political and legal justification for the creation of the Transnistrian Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic.
On September 2, 1990, this congress, by its resolution, formed the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic. With the inclusion in the Transnistrian MSSR: Grigoriopol, Dubossary (Left Bank part), Rybnitsa, Slobodzeya (including the right bank part) districts; cities of Bendery, Dubossary, Rybnitsa and Tiraspol. On this day, the Declaration “On the Formation of the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic” was also adopted.
On August 27, 1991, the Parliament of the Republic of Moldova in Chisinau adopted the “Declaration of Independence of the Republic of Moldova.”
The Declaration declared: “The Republic of Moldova is a sovereign independent and democratic state that can freely, without outside interference, decide its present and future in accordance with the ideals and sacred aspirations of the people in the historical and ethnic space of its national formation.” In addition, it was demanded ""from the Government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics to begin negotiations with the Government of the Republic of Moldova on ending the illegal state of its occupation and to withdraw Soviet troops from the national territory of the Republic of Moldova." The national leaders of Moldova relatively quickly change the revolutionary modification of the national revanchist ideology to the statist one - as their “small”, subordinate nation becomes a “big”, dominant one.
Finding themselves after the collapse of the USSR in the role of leaders of a “small empire”, torn apart from within by ethno-sovereignist movements of even smaller ethnic groups - Gagauz, Russians and Ukrainians, they immediately turned into real “power holders”, most concerned with the preservation of “constitutional order and legality” "".
In Moldova, the selection and promotion of personnel has begun business qualities, but depending on knowledge of the state language and their nationality.
The disruption of economic ties in Transnistria, as well as throughout Moldova, led to a disruption in the supply of raw materials and energy resources, and made it difficult to sell products.
Reference. The Transnistrian Moldavian Republic (PMR) occupies a favorable geographical position between the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine and occupies a narrow strip of territory along the left bank of the Dniester with an area of 4163 square meters. km with a total length of borders of 816 km. The population of Transnistria is 556 thousand people. And it has enormous potential by Moldovan standards (12% of the total area of Moldova, 17% of the population). Transnistria includes the Grigoriopol, Dubossary, Kamensky, Rybnitsky, Slobodzeya districts of the former Moldavian SSR, as well as the cities of Tiraspol and Bendery (Tighina).
On the eve of the collapse of the USSR in 1989-1991, Transnistria was an industrialized part of the agrarian republic of Moldova. Large industrial enterprises of Transnistria were subordinated to the union, and were much more closely connected with the industrial centers of Ukraine and Russia than with Chisinau. Among the directors of Transnistrian industrial enterprises, as well as among the then party nomenklatura, there were no Moldovans, as in the republican nomenklatura - this environment was dominated by people from the big cities of Russia and Ukraine.
The entire industry of the former Moldavian SSR was concentrated in Transnistria. Almost all of the region's industry is export-oriented. On the eve of the collapse of the USSR in 1989-1991, Transnistria was an industrialized part of the agrarian republic of Moldova. Large industrial enterprises of Transnistria were subordinated to the union, and were much more closely connected with the industrial centers of Ukraine and Russia than with Chisinau. Among the directors of Transnistrian industrial enterprises, as well as among the then party nomenklatura, there were no Moldovans, as in the republican nomenklatura - this environment was dominated by people from the big cities of Russia and Ukraine. And today the state of the local economy is no worse than in Moldova, which does not create additional incentives for Transnistria to join the new state entity.
In 1989, protests and strikes began at enterprises in Transnistria in response to the decision of the Moldovan authorities to deprive Russian of the status of the state language. In January 1990, a city referendum was held - Tiraspol, the capital of Transnistria, was given the status of an independent territory. Then the same decisions are made by other regions of the left bank of Moldova. By March 1992, a full-scale war began in the region using heavy weapons. In August of the same year, the warring parties, still only in the city of Bendery, were separated for the first time by Russian peacekeeping forces. Since 1993, there have been no armed conflicts in Transnistria, and since that time negotiations on the status of this territory have begun.
Transnistria produces 34% of fruits and vegetables, 35% of industrial products and 6% of consumer goods. The largest power plant in the region is located here - the Dniester GRES, which generates 90% of the electricity in all of Moldova. The largest transport route, the gas pipeline, passes through its territory, which supplies gas to Moldova. The republic controls 270 km of the Ukrainian-Moldovan border.
On the territory of the PMR there are monopolistic enterprises, such as the Tiraspol Foundry Machinery Plant, which during the Soviet Union accounted for almost the entire production volume of the entire USSR), the Moldavian Refrigerated Truck Plant (63%), the Moldovkabel plant (63%), the Elektromash plants, "Electroapparatus" etc.
Almost 90% of PMR products go to Russia and other CIS countries. There are about 100 joint ventures operating in the PMR, almost independent of the Moldovan economy.
The republic has the necessary attributes of statehood - controlled territory, parliament, president, government, independent judicial system, defense, budget.
By the way, back in 1924 - 1940, Transnistria, as an autonomous republic, was part of Ukraine. 39% of Moldovans, 26% of Ukrainians and 23% of Russians live in Transnistria.
An excursion into history. Even in the Middle Ages, the Left Bank of both the Dniester and the Prut was a zone of mixed settlement of Slavs, Moldovans and nomadic peoples of the Northern Black Sea region. The Slavs, together with other communities, are the indigenous ethnicity of the region and this ethnicity had its own statehood. In the X-beginning of the XII century. the territory of Bessarabia was part of the Old Russian state, then the Galician and Galician-Volyn principalities. In this capacity, she shared the fate of the Slavs, ending up in the middle of the 13th century. under the rule of the Golden Horde, liberation from which again became possible thanks to the joint efforts of all the peoples of the region with the Slavs.
In 1359, the Principality of Moldova was established. However, very soon it falls under the control of the Ottoman Empire. At the turn of the 17th and 18th centuries. in the area between the Prut and Dniester rivers, the interests of the Sublime Porte collided with the ambitious aspirations of the Romanovs.
The 1711 agreement between Peter I and the Moldavian ruler Cantemir stipulated that if the war against the Turks was successful, the Russian border with Moldova would pass along the Dniester. As a result of the Russian-Turkish war of 1787-1792. Transnistria goes to Russia.
In 1812, according to the Bucharest Peace Treaty with Turkey, the area between the Prut and Dniester rivers was included in the Russian Empire, where the Bessarabian province was created. This area was in the 19th and early 20th centuries. was part of the Kherson and Podolsk provinces.
In December 1917, after the occupation of Bessarabia by Romanian troops, its reunification with the “historical homeland” was proclaimed. The left bank of the Dniester, even in those troubled times, remains with Russia.
The idea of creating the MASSR was submitted by members of the RCP(b), formerly members of the Romanian Communist Party A. Nicholas, P. Kieran, I. Dick, A. Badulescu. They wrote a letter to the Central Committee of the RCP(b) and the Central Committee of the Communist Party (b)U, dated February 1924. He made a similar request to the Central Committee of the RCP(b) and G.I. Kotovsky. The requests were heard, and at the meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) held on March 7, 1924 (July 29, 1924), it was decided:
a) Consider it necessary, first of all, for political reasons, to separate the Moldovan population into a special Autonomous Republic within the Ukrainian SSR and propose that the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine give corresponding directives to the Ukrainian Soviet authorities.
b) Invite the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine to make a report to the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party in a month about the progress of work on organizing the Moldavian Autonomous Republic.
c) Entrust Comrade Frunze with monitoring the speedy implementation of this issue" (Minutes No. 13).
During this “investigation of the issue,” data on the size of the Moldovan population were noticeably falsified in relation to the censuses of 1897 and 1920, which was dictated by the same political considerations. Of course, there was no talk of any forms of free will during the creation of the MASSR, as even the very formulations about “political expediency” and, especially, about the “relevant directives” of the party bodies to the Soviet - in the spirit and letter of the doctrine, bodies of people's self-government - openly indicate . It is difficult not to see here a prototype of the coming drama: the rejection by the party leadership of the USSR of the will of the people of Transnistria, expressed through the Soviets, which will be discussed in more detail below. But even in 1924, the entire procedure had a strictly command nature: directives from the highest party bodies were sent to local party organizations and accepted for unconditional execution.
On October 12, 1924, the III session of the Central Executive Committee of Ukraine decided to form the Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (MASSR) as part of the Ukrainian SSR on two-thirds of the Transnistrian lands populated by Slavs. The new autonomous republic covered 11 districts on the left bank of the Dniester with a population of 545.5 thousand people. The territory of the republic was 8.1 thousand square meters. km.
The city of Balta became its capital, and from 1929 the center of autonomy was moved closer to Moldova - to Tiraspol, apparently keeping in mind that if the turn really comes to transferring autonomy to the future socialist Moldova, then it would be inappropriate to give it to composition and a purely Ukrainian city).
In Romania, this fact did not pass by the parliament, and on one November day in 1924, the parliament of royal Romania was buzzing and worried: there was a heated debate in the Senate on the question of how to understand Moscow’s new and undoubtedly “insidious” move - its creation of the Moldavian, or, as they often said then, the Moldavian Republic (MASSR as part of the Ukrainian SSR). Moreover, on the left bank of the Dniester, on a territory that has never been part of the Moldavian Principality since its foundation in the 14th century; and throughout the short life of the Romanian state itself, it was never the object of any claims on its part. The debate was intense. Calming the excited meeting, Prime Minister K. Bratianu ironically and, as the future showed, very far-sightedly remarked: “I do not want to dwell now and here on the intentions and calculations of the moment, because of which such a republic was formed. I want to consider this issue from a more general and distant point of view. We (Romanians) cannot be concerned, but on the contrary, we can only rejoice that the neighboring state has recognized that in our territorial claims we have not gone as far as we should have."
At the same time, in 1924, the newspaper Lupta, close to military circles, reported: “Military circles received information that at the same time as the proclamation of the republic, the possibility cannot be ruled out that the Romanian villages of Transnistria, dissatisfied with the Bolshevik regime, will decide to send delegations to us to declare that they are on the side of Romania." And further: “In the case of Soviet propaganda in Bessarabia for its unification with the Transnistria Republic, the Soviets risk arousing the intention of the Romanian villages of Transnistria to switch to our side.” Thus, the plot of the upcoming drama, in its main features, took shape precisely in those autumn days 1924, and all of it, as at its core, is concentrated in the opposition of two prefixes: “for-” and “for-”. When the left bank of the Dniester is called Transnistria (Transnistria), this means that Romania is taken as the starting point, moving east not only from the Prut, but also from the Dniester. Calling it Transnistria implies something else: the starting point in this case is Russia, moving southwest, to the Black Sea region, and including the lands adjacent to the Dniester from the east. This core still had to detonate the explosion. The years that have passed since that distant autumn - the years that included both the catastrophe of the Second World War and the dearly paid post-war stability of Europe, frozen within seemingly unshakable borders - by the beginning of the last decade of the 20th century, the unrest that shook 60 years ago this corner of Europe, where the Carpathians meet the Balkans, distant and somehow toy-like, like the intrigues of medieval German courts. Myalo K.G. Russia and the last wars of the twentieth century (1989-2000). M.: “Veche” -P.96
From the very beginning, the formation of the MASSR was focused on the possibility of restoring the “historical status quo.” Such an opportunity presented itself in the “black” for Romania in 1940, when, under the influence of Germany and Italy, as a result of the Second Vienna Arbitration, it was forced to cede Northern Transylvania to Hungary, and a little later (under the Treaty of Craiova) Dobruja to Bulgaria.
A month and a half before these events - June 26 and 27, 1940 - the Soviet government issued two ultimatums to Romania demanding the unconditional return of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina to the USSR.
According to the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact, some historians say, part of Northern Bukovina and Bessarabia moved from Romania to the USSR. In reality, Romania occupied Bessarabia in December 1917 and occupied Bukovina in November 1918.
I would like to remind you that in the secret additional protocol of August 23, 1939, signed by Ribbentrop and Molotov, paragraph 3 states: “With regard to South-Eastern Europe, the Soviet side indicated its interest in Bessarabia. The German side clearly stated its complete political disinterest in these territories.” . Did the Soviet side have the right to such wording? It certainly did, because Romania had already illegally occupied Bessarabia for 21 years at that time.
Yes, indeed, on June 28, 1940, the Red Army entered Romania, and Bessarabia again found itself within the USSR.
Here it is necessary to return to Henri Barbusse’s book “Stalin”, where there is the following passage: “The German army tore the Baltic countries and Finland from Russia. The Allies tore Poland away from it and, supplementing it with pieces of Austria and Germany, created an independent state... They stole Bessarabia from the Soviet state in order to pay Romania with it, disregarding the wishes of the Bessarabians."
We will not refer to the authority of Henri Barbusse, but we should pay attention to the lexical nuance: one thing was “torn off”, “torn away” - this is all from the political lexicon and suddenly “stole”... And this word is not accidental here, in the literature of the twenties years, a similar interpretation regarding Bessarabia occurs. The point turns out to be that in December 1917, Romania occupied Bessarabia.
On March 5, 1918, in Iasi (and in Odessa on March 9, 1918), with the participation of the Entente powers, representatives of Romania in Moscow signed the “Agreement between the RSFSR and Romania on the cleansing of Bessarabia by Romania.”
According to this agreement, Romania pledged to clear Bessarabia within two months. Immediately she clears the strategic point of Zhebryany - an area lying in the depths of the bay, near the mouth of the Danube. All areas cleared by Romanian troops are now occupied by Russian troops. After two months, a Romanian detachment of 10,000 men remains in Bessarabia to guard Romanian warehouses and railway lines.
Romania did not fulfill its obligation; moreover, Romania repeatedly appealed to the Entente powers to make a decision to include Bessarabia within Romania, but it never received an international legal document for the ownership of Bessarabia. Thus, the agreement of March 5, 1918 remained in force. But Romania ignored him. That is why Henri Barbusse came up with a word that is not from the political lexicon - “stolen.”
Moscow note. On June 26, 1940, the Soviet Union sent an “Ultimate Note to the Romanian Government,” where it was emphasized: “The USSR Government considers the issue of the return of Bessarabia to be organically connected with the issue of transferring to the Soviet Union that part of Bukovina, the vast majority of whose population is associated with Soviet Ukraine as a historical community fate, as well as the commonality of language and national composition. Such an act would be all the more just because the transfer of the northern part of Bukovina to the Soviet Union could represent, albeit only to a small extent, a means of redressing the enormous damage that was inflicted on the Soviet Union and the population. Bessarabia by the 22-year rule of Romania in Bessarabia. The Government of the USSR proposes to the Royal Government of Romania:
1. Return Bessarabia to the Soviet Union.
2. Transfer to the Soviet Union the northern part of Bukovina within the borders according to the “attached map.”
And he forced Romania to fulfill its obligations on March 5, 1918 and nothing more.
June 28, 1940 Red Army troops enter these territories. In accordance with the decision of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR adopted in August of the same year, the regions of Transnistria were also included in the borders of the formed Moldavian SSR. The Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic is abolished. Most of it is part of the new Moldavian Union Republic, the southern and northern sectors of Bessarabia (including Moldova’s access to the Black Sea, and the first capital of the MASSR, Balta) remain part of Soviet Ukraine.
(In fact, on August 2, 1940, the Moldavian SSR was formed, into which the law established “to include the city of Tiraspol and Grigoriopolsky. Dubossary, Kamensky, Rybnitsky, Slobodzeya and Tiraspolsky districts of the Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, the city of Chisinau and Beltsky, Bendery, Chisinau, Kakul, Orhei and Soroca districts of Bessarabia." As we see, the law is not even in alphabetical order, but by priority: first the regions of the Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, and then the regions of Bessarabia annexed to the USSR. A trifle, but the emphasis begins to shift: Bessarabia was, as it were, annexed to the already existing Moldavian Republic based on Transnistria.
Thus, the historically established ties between the ethnicities cohabiting in the region were tied into a tight knot, the end of which was securely tied to the all-Union Center. Problems with this node began precisely when this very Center fell.
Redistribution of Soviet heritage. The return of Bessarabia to the USSR in July 1940 marked the legitimization of Tiraspol's power over the territory of the republic liberated from Romanian occupation. At the same time, the capital was moved from Tiraspol to Chisinau, and on August 2, 1940, the autonomy was transformed into the MSSR.
It should be recalled that the act of the Moldovan parliament in July 1990 (“on the illegality and invalidity” of the fact of creating its own state) automatically restored the so-called MASSR, which existed until August 2, 1940. Thus, the highest body of state power of the MSSR legally declared the self-liquidation of the republic, and declared its geographical space to be Romanian territory, allegedly forcibly occupied by the Soviet Union. And this means that from a legal point of view, today’s “suzerain” claims of Chisinau to the PMR are, to put it mildly, unfounded!
In our opinion, Ukraine and Russia should have set conditions before official Chisinau for further negotiations on Transnistria.
The Parliament of the Republic of Moldova should have canceled the July 1990 resolution on the denunciation of the Act of Creation of the MSSR. Otherwise, we will have to recognize the PMR as the legitimate successor of Soviet Moldova with the opening of embassies in Tiraspol. And then the participants in the negotiation process must strive for the adoption of the PMR in the UN, OSCE, CIS and other structures.
Both the official parliamentary statement of August 27, 1989 and the “Declaration of State Sovereignty of the Republic of Moldova” of June 23, 1990 contain language condemning the Pact and the actions taken in 1940 that united Moldova and Transnistria within the USSR. Both texts of statements can be considered as tacitly sanctioning the declaration of independence of Transnistria, which occurred during the same period as a result of a series of referendums.
Declaration of Independence. The independence of Transnistria was proclaimed on September 2, 1990 after Moldova adopted two documents recognizing as illegal the actions that led to the unification of Moldova and Transnistria within the MSSR.
Let me remind you that, based on the results of referendums, Transnistria declared its independence - almost a year before the declaration of independence in Moldova and Ukraine. All three countries declared independence unilaterally. However, Transnistria was the only state whose declaration of independence was preceded by a referendum that determined the will of the people.
For it was only on December 1 that Ukrainian voters approved secession from the USSR. The referendum on the independence of Moldova took place only in March 1994. As stated in report B219, prepared in April 2006 by the International Council for Democratic Institutions and State Sovereignty - MS DIiGS), "State sovereignty of the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic (PMR) in accordance with international law." (“State sovereignty of Prednistrovskaia Moldavskaia Respublika (Prednistrovie) under international Law” (ICDISS): Moldova’s desire for independence since 1989 was fueled by national hatred and discrimination against the Slavic people, who formed the majority of the population in Transnistria, but were a minority in Moldova.
Collapse of the Moldavian SSR. Historically, Transnistria has never been part of Moldova. According to the statement of the highest legislative body in Chisinau on August 2, 1989, the Soviet Union committed an act of aggression by uniting both sides and incorporating them into the USSR. Four days later, the local parliament, which did not have the relevant powers at the time but justified its actions by citing the people's right to self-determination, adopted a language law, declaring Romanian the state language and replacing the Cyrillic script with Latin. Subsequently, the flag was changed, and the Moldovan authorities ceased to submit to the central government. Moldova’s repeated call “to eliminate the political and legal consequences” of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (it is possible that this was a fake that appeared in the late 80s of the twentieth century, which was supposed to give impetus to the collapse of the USSR) was followed by the declaration of independence as Transnistria in 1990, and Moldova in 1991, which put an end to their “forced marriage” within the MSSR. The modern Republic of Moldova bases its formation and existence on a unilateral declaration of independence, accompanied by the statement that the forced unification of Moldova and Transnistria at the beginning of the 2nd World War (to quote the declaration) was devoid of "any real legal basis." Considering this application within the framework of international law, Moldova refers to the status quo ante bellum (the situation that existed before the war) as the basis for its independence. The consequence of this principle is the inability of the plaintiff to claim territory that did not belong to him before the occupation and annexation.
Legal and factual analyzes demonstrate that during the collapse of the Soviet Union, the MSSR split into two successor states: Moldova and Transnistria, and that the existing border between them closely corresponds to the traditional historical border separating them from early Middle Ages. The current situation on the former territory of the MSSR indicates that the actual self-liquidation of the MSSR in July 1990 makes the current Chisinau regime illegitimate. While the PMR is, in fact, the legal successor of the MASSR, which was previously part of Ukraine. That is, today the PMR is a more legitimate entity than the Republic of Moldova. For some reason our politicians are silent about this?!
The current situation on the former territory of the MSSR indicates that the actual self-liquidation of the MSSR in July 1990 makes the current Chisinau regime illegitimate. While the PMR is, in fact, the legal successor of the MASSR, which was previously part of Ukraine. That is, today the PMR is a more legitimate entity than the Republic of Moldova.
What the experts say. In the report “State sovereignty of the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic (PMR) in accordance with international legislation,” experts summarize: “Many years of international practice, collected in charters, allow us to list the criteria used to determine statehood: permanent population, defined territory, government, ability to enter in relations with other states. Transnistria now meets all the requirements: Transnistria has its own democratically elected president and legislature, which is currently under the control of the opposition party. His government commands the armed forces and enters into discussions with foreign countries."
In the case of the DMR, the viability of the state is established, as is the legitimacy of the state formation process. More than half a million people living in Transnistria, which occupies an area of 4,163 sq. km., successfully meet all the criteria of statehood in accordance with international law. Transnistria has a well-functioning government with its own institutions, constitution, currency, taxation, jurisprudence and a population larger than many UN member countries.
The right of the PMR to self-determination is no less respected than the principle of the territorial integrity of Moldova, of which this unrecognized republic has never been a part of the republic historically.
As we can see, the conclusions are convincing, and the situation itself shows that for 16 years the PMR has confirmed its viability. And it’s hardly worth “democratizing” it like Iraq. Moldova should come to its senses and leave the PMR alone. Pridnestrovians are not very eager to move to Moldova, which ranks last in Europe in terms of living standards. And the blood shed by the Pridnestrovians in 1992 remained forever in their memory.
Armed conflict. Transnistria, which has a predominantly Russian-speaking population and the most developed industry, categorically rejected the idea of joining Romania and advocated autonomy. Ukraine and Russia began to get involved in the conflict, one way or another. Russia protects the Russian-speaking population, Ukraine is extremely concerned about the prospect of a “hot spot” appearing on its border and the likelihood of being drawn into an armed conflict.
When, through the efforts of Russia and Ukraine, the conflict moved into a calmer direction, the Moldovan government began to take into account that there were a number of objective reasons preventing unification with Romania:
Firstly, in Bessarabia they still remembered that in Romania Moldovans were second-class citizens;
secondly, the economy of Moldova, the standard of living of its citizens was higher than in Romania;
thirdly, Moldovans and Romanians have completely different national characters. “In spirit, we are much closer to the Slavs than to our Romanian brothers,” said one of the Moldovan diplomats.
The outbreak of violence in relations between the new state of Moldova and the Transnistrian Moldavian Republic (PMR), which rejected it, already in the spring of 1992 resulted in an armed conflict.
In fact, the first clash occurred on May 20, 1990, when a unit of FNM militants, including police officers in disguise, tried to hoist the Romanian flag over the city of Bendery.
October 25, 1990. Moldovan police and volunteers (read, mercenaries), under Romanian banners, armed to the teeth, tried to establish “constitutional order” in Gagauzia, but the workers of Transnistria came to the aid of the Gagauzians and repelled the aggression.
Residents of Dubossary, not wanting to let drunken volunteer-police rabble into the city, barricaded the bridge across the Dniester. Against citizens armed with a picket fence, General-Executioner Kostash threw opontsy (special police) in full equipment and gave the order to conduct targeted fire. Three young people died: Moldovans Oleg Geletyuk and Valery Mitsul, Ukrainian Vladimir Gotka.
Begun at the end of 1990 by punitive actions of the Chisinau special police detachment (OPON) in Dubossary, the forceful suppression of “aliens” and “separatists” (as the ruling circles of Moldova called the Slavic population and Turkic-speaking Gagauz living in the southern regions of the republic) on March 1, 1992 . escalated into a conflict.
Let me remind you that political events in that January developed according to their own scenario. Ukraine was the first in the CIS to announce the creation of its own armed forces. The 14th Army in January 1992 was still operationally subordinate to the Odessa Military District. The district's troops were commanded by Colonel General Ivan Morozov, who previously served in the Far East.
January 16, 1992 Yuri Maksimovich Netkachev newly appointed commander of the 14th Combined Arms Army with Deputy Commander-in-Chief Ground forces Colonel General Boris Gromov flew from the Chkalovsky airfield to Tiraspol. Gromov was instructed to introduce Major General Yu.M. Netkachev, commander of the 14th Combined Arms Army, to the personnel of the 14th Army in return for Lieutenant General Gennady Yakovlev and local leadership.
Reference. Yuri Maksimovich Netkachev graduated from the Academy in 1988 General Staff and Bobruisk also arrived to take the post of first deputy commander of the 5th Guards Tank Army and from this position was appointed to the post of army commander of the 14th OA. The main grouping of the 14th Army, the main striking forces were located on its territory. The officers were given an ultimatum: if you take the Ukrainian oath, you will remain to serve; if you don’t take it, good riddance. The then President of Ukraine Leonid Kravchuk declared all army real estate, equipment, weapons and property to be the property of the republic.
In February 1992, the Odessa district was already headed by a new commander, Lieutenant General V.G. Radetsky. He clearly stated to the commander of the 14th Combined Arms Army, Major General Netkachev: “You do not obey us, since you are stationed in Moldova. You have your own wedding, we have ours.” From the most powerful military group that covered the southwestern borders of the USSR, I, the army commander who took over the affairs and position, had almost a third of the troops left: the 59th motorized rifle division in Tiraspol, two missile brigades in Balti and Bendery, other units stationed in territory of Moldova. Here, in the neighborhood, there remained units of district subordination that were not part of the 14th Army - engineer brigades in Dubossary and Rybnitsa, a pontoon-bridge regiment in Bendery, etc. About 10 thousand officers lived on the territory of the PMR, who at one time served in the 14th Army.
By March 1992. The confrontation between Chisinau and Tiraspol escalated into an armed conflict. Due to the increasingly deteriorating political situation, a presidential emergency was declared on March 28, 1992.
As one would expect, not only local (government and “unconstitutional”) armed formations were involved in it, but also units of the 14th Army of the former USSR stationed in Moldova, as well as mercenaries and volunteers from the CIS countries and Romania.
On March 29, 1992, on the anniversary of the unification of Bessarabia, the opposition was preparing a rally throughout Moldova, planning to go out to them with the slogans of “the resignation of the president.” However, the President of Moldova, Mircea Snegur, launched a preemptive strike and on March 28, on the eve of the rally, announced the introduction of a state of emergency in Transnistria. The decree disrupted the work of the conciliation commission and caused a sharp escalation of the conflict, but the opposition turned into an ally of the president.
Weapons of Moldova. An important role in equipping the newly created armed forces of Moldova was played by weapons and military equipment 14th army. Soviet generals and officers advanced equipment and weapons national formations throughout the Soviet Union. According to available information, the commander of the 14th Army Major General Netkachev handed over to Moldova as of April 15, 1992, the following weapons and military equipment:
5381 BHI (storage base in Floresti)
21 R-145 radios based on the BTR-60;
sound broadcasting station ZS-88;
3 reconnaissance chemical vehicles RKhM-4;
54 MTLB-AT tracked tractors;
2 reconnaissance chemical vehicles on the MTLB chassis;
27 9P148 ATGM based on BRDM;
12 anti-aircraft guns of 57 mm caliber;
32 ZU-23 anti-aircraft guns.
4th Artillery Regiment of Ungheni:
32 152-mm D-20 gun-howitzers;
21 152-mm Giatsint 2A36 cannons;
7 radio stations R-145;
20 1B18 and 1B19;
53 MTLB-AT tracked tractors;
6 mobile reconnaissance points;
603rd Regiment Ungheni:
28 Uragan multiple launch rocket systems of 280 mm caliber;
1 BM13 "Katyusha".
275 anti-aircraft missile brigade Chisinau
2 S-200 anti-aircraft missile battalions;
3 S-75 anti-aircraft missile battalions;
4 S-125 anti-aircraft missile battalions.
86th Fighter Aviation Regiment Murculesti:
31 MiG-29 aircraft;
2 MiG-29UB aircraft.
Helicopter squad of Chisinau:
4 Mi-24 helicopters;
4 Mi-4 helicopters.
Small arms (only in the armed forces of Moldova):
27 RPG-7;
2714 Kalashnikov AK-74 assault rifle;
50 machine guns;
882 Makarov pistols. The price of betrayal//Day. - May 10-16, 1992. - No. 19.
As a result of concessions from Moscow and with the connivance of Air Marshal Evgeniy Shaposhnikov, in the spring of 1992, Moldova privatized:
MLRS regiment "Uragan" - 24 units, division of heavy mortars "Pion" (they can fire nuclear weapons), anti-tank regiment - 54 units (AT guns "Rapier").
In addition, at the storage base near Chisinau there were 220 MTLB, as well as about 12 thousand small arms.
In 1993, after the withdrawal of the personnel of the parachute regiment from the Moldovan capital, about 120 airborne combat vehicles (BMD-1) remained there.
Weapons of Transnistria. The Pridnestrovians privatized fewer weapons, but these weapons would have been enough to conduct large-scale military operations. The PMR guardsmen were given about 7 thousand small arms; as a result of the betrayal of some officers, they “seized” an anti-tank battery, 7 tanks, and about 10 armored personnel carriers. At one time, the Pridnestrovians themselves produced 82-mm mortars, possibly small arms.
Following the example of Ukraine, Igor Smirnov signed a decree according to which military camps and everything that remained in them were declared the property of the self-proclaimed republic.
By the summer of 1992, the war took on a positional character. The theater of military operations expanded and covered the left bank villages of Rogi, Kochieri, Pogreby, Koshnitsa, Pyryta and Dorotskoye on the approaches to Dubossary, as well as the right bank city of Bendery with the villages of Giska and Kitskany. Residential areas of the Transnistrian regional centers of Dubossary and Grigoriopol were subjected to systematic shelling. In such a situation, an attempt to separate the conflicting parties in Bendery with the help of military observers from Russia, Ukraine, Moldova and Romania did not yield results.
On May 23, “to ensure the territorial integrity of Moldova,” by order of its President Mircea Snegur, combat units of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of National Security were transferred to the subordination of the Ministry of Defense. Such transformations, taking into account the gratuitous transfer of weapons from the former Soviet army to Moldova (including the MiG-29 air regiment in Marculesti) by the Commander-in-Chief of the United Armed Forces of the CIS, Evgeniy Shaposhnikov, could only mean an escalation of the conflict.
True, on June 18, Moldovan parliamentarians, together with Transnistrian deputies, approved the basic principles of a peaceful settlement, which provided for the separation of the warring parties, the disbandment of volunteer paramilitary forces (this concerned, first of all, the Transnistrian side) and the return of refugees to their places of permanent residence. It seemed to everyone that the war would end any moment, but it only took one day for these illusions to dissipate.
In June, the same opposition sharply opposed the peace proposals of the Moldovan parliament, after which On June 10, the top leadership of the republic issued an order to begin a punitive operation in the city of Bendery. The invasion of the city by a motorized brigade was accompanied by a radio speech by President Snegur, thereby demonstrating his personal involvement in this action. Its result is 200 dead and more than 300 wounded in just three days, June 19-21.
The formal reason for the operation was an incident, the essence of which is now impossible to determine. According to Snegur, on June 19, “illegal guard formations and other paramilitary units launched a violent attack on the local police department.” According to Transnistrian sources, on that day, Moldovan police captured a PMR guard officer, and a group of guards who came to his aid was fired upon. One way or another, a minor skirmish escalated into street fighting. At 19.00 along the Chisinau and Caushani highways Moldovan columns of armored personnel carriers, artillery, and T-55 tanks entered Bendery.
Within a few hours the city was occupied by the Moldovan army. Indiscriminate shooting from all types of weapons led to a huge number of civilian casualties. Massive strikes were carried out by the RM units on the building of the city executive committee, the barracks of the guards, and the city police department.
At dawn on June 20, units of the Moldovan army captured the Bendery-1 station and the housing and social bank. The fire was conducted by tanks, self-propelled guns, and armored personnel carriers; Mortar shelling of the city came from the village of Lipkani. One of the mines hit the fuel depot of military unit 48414 of the 14th Army of Russia, which led to the death of Russian soldiers. Several tanks of the PMR armed forces tried to break into Bendery to help the defenders, but were stopped by the fire of Rapier anti-tank guns.
In the afternoon, units of the Moldovan army launched an assault on the Bendery fortress, where the missile brigade of the 14th Army was located. When repelling the attack from the Russian side, there were killed and wounded. Several more servicemen were injured by Russian military units that “accidentally” flew into the territory. Throughout the entire day of June 20, provocations by the Moldovan army continued against the 14th Army, which occupied a position of strict neutrality in the conflict.
Seeing how the city was being destroyed, women from the Bendery Strike Committee captured several pieces of military equipment from the 59th Motorized Rifle Division of the Russian Army. Using this technique, the guards, Cossacks and militia from Tiraspol moved towards Bendery, crushing both Moldovan artillery batteries on the bridge, and made their way to the besieged building of the city executive committee. These tanks broke through the siege ring. The RM troops began to retreat randomly. By the morning of June 21, they controlled only two microdistricts of Bender and the suburban village of Varnitsa.
On Sunday On June 21, fighting for the city continued. At about 12.00 mortar shelling of the Leninsky microdistrict began; the city was filled with Moldovan snipers, shooting at any moving target. Due to the ongoing fighting, it was impossible to remove corpses from the streets, which in 30-degree heat created the threat of epidemics. Residents buried the dead right in their yards, at the scene of death.
June 22 The fighting in Bendery did not stop. The Bulgarian village of Parkany was subjected to severe shelling.
June 23 The Moldovan Air Force was tasked with destroying the strategically important bridge across the Dniester connecting Transnistria with Bendery. Two MiG-29 aircraft were used to carry out the strike, each carrying six OFAB-250 bombs. Probably, to monitor the results of the raid, one MiG-29UB took part in the operation.
At 19.15, Moldovan pilots fired bombs, but inaccurately and the bridge remained intact, and all the bombs fell on the nearby village of Parcani. The house in which the entire family died was destroyed by a direct hit. Moldovan officials initially denied that their air force was involved in the raid; however, later the Minister of War of the Republic of Moldova admitted the fact of the destruction of the house, but completely rejected media statements about the death of people.
However, on June 23 there was relative calm. The city council managed to negotiate a ceasefire with the police department in order to bury the dead, the number of which reached three hundred over the past night. There was no electricity in the city, telephone communications did not work, and there was no gas. The snipers were still active. The local police, holding part of the city with the support of the OPON, mined the streets, erected barricades, and dug trenches.
June 29 The calm ended: at about 19:00 the Moldavian army resumed massive shelling of the city from howitzers, mortars, grenade launchers and small arms. The PMR armed formations managed to suppress some enemy firing points only after three or four days.
At the beginning of July, a ceasefire agreement was again reached, which, however, was constantly violated not only in Bendery, but along the entire line of confrontation right up to Duboscap. In Bendery, parts of Moldova systematically destroyed enterprises whose equipment could not be removed. Throughout the month, fighting took place in different areas of the city.
During the fighting in 1992, Bendery was subjected to severe destruction, 80 thousand residents became refugees, about one and a half thousand were killed and wounded. Now the bulk of the destruction has been eliminated, but traces of the battles still remind of themselves. For the courage and heroism shown by Bendery residents in defending the gains of the PMR, in 1995 the city was awarded the highest award - the Order of the Republic.
The attempt of the Moldovan army to take Bendery, made in July on the orders of Chisinau, failed. The then commander of the 14th Army stationed in Transnistria, Major General Alexander Lebed, ordered to block the approaches to the city and the bridge across the Dniester.
For all 40 days, the Moldovan military mocked everything that came to their hands, and tried to knock down the flag of Transnistria, which rose on the administration building on the main square of the city of Bendery.
No one expected such a turn of events, so during the summer hostilities on the part of the Pridnestrovians, more than 500 people died and 80 went missing. The Moldovan side does not disclose the number of casualties of its military to this day.
Only on July 21, the presidents of Russia and Moldova, Boris Yeltsin and Mircea Snegur, signed an agreement “On the principles of the peaceful resolution of the armed conflict in the Transnistrian region of the Republic of Moldova.”
The agreement has been signed, but the conflict has not yet been resolved.
Only on July 29, 1992, the Tula Military Landing Division entered Bendery and established peace in the region. To this day, Russian peacekeeping forces are holding back the confrontation and preventing the possibility of military action in Bendery.
Russia, Moldova and Transnistria declared the strip along the Dniester a security zone, the control of which was entrusted to a trilateral peacekeeping force consisting of Russian, Moldavian and Transnistrian contingents under the supervision of the Joint Control Commission (JCC). Bendery was declared a “security zone” with a special regime.
Romania's interest in the situation in Transnistria, as well as the facts of the supply of weapons and the direct participation of Romanian citizens in the conflict, strengthened anti-Romanian sentiments both on the left bank of the Dniester, and in Moscow, and among the indigenous residents of Moldova.
During the armed conflict, the Moldovan army, as well as in Transnistria, found itself with a large amount of weapons (and modern ones) and ammunition. According to unofficial data, these weapons, taking into account the police and militia units already formed by Moldova, will be enough to form two motorized rifle regiments and combat support units. Considering that Moldova has such combat systems as “Hurricane”, “Gyacinth”, and multi-role fighter-bombers MiG-29, it could be assumed that the period of stabilization of the military-political situation in the region would be long.
The armed conflict in Transnistria placed a heavy burden on the economy of Moldova, setting it back for many years. The costs of military operations in Transnistria amounted to 4 million rubles, in Moldova - up to 15 million rubles per day. Destructions in the city of Bendery account for more than 50% of the total number of buildings.
Let us give the tragic figures of the 1992 war: more than 500 dead residents of the PMR and foreign citizens who assisted it in repelling the aggression of Moldova were officially registered: residents of Tiraspol - 109 people; Bender - 209; Slobodzeya district - 14; Grigoriopol district - 9; Dubossary district - 58; Rybnitsa district - 22; Kamensky district - 3; foreign citizens - 76 people. Moreover, 389 dead were fighters defending the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic with weapons in their hands, including: Republican Guard - 124 people; People's militia - 137; Cossacks - 84; TSO - 36; MGB "Delta" battalion - 4; battalion of the Ministry of Internal Affairs "Dniester" - 4 people. But this is not final data, since people to this day continue to die from wounds and diseases received in the war, and the ruthless bloody statistics of war continue to grow.
According to the Moldovan parliament member Postovana, losses among the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the MNS were: 152 dead, including 69 police officers, 11 carabinieri, 13 MNS employees, and 573 wounded.
The large number of killed and wounded, destitute due to the loss of housing, on both sides, will cause mutual hatred for many years to come. The destroyed economy will not cope with providing for the population; social explosions and government instability should be expected both in Moldova and Transnistria.
The defeat of the Popular Front in the 1994 parliamentary elections and the coming to power of the agrarian-democratic party, more loyal to national minorities, created the conditions for peace negotiations between Chisinau and two regions isolated from it: Gagauzia and Transnistria. The worsening economic situation also prompted the search for ways to unite the republic. What attempts to forcefully resolve interethnic and interregional problems lead to was understood in Moldova by the example of the military conflict in Transnistria.
Gagauzia. In the south of the republic in the Budzhak steppe, the Gagauz (Turkic group of the Orthodox faith) settled more than two centuries ago and today number about 160 thousand people. In 1989, they declared for the first time that they recognized themselves as a people, and appealed to Chisinau with a request to grant them autonomy. In 1991, after the intensification of the movement for reunification with Romania, led by the Popular Front, five southern regions declared themselves independent from Moldova, the Gagauz Republic, on August 19, 1990, and created their own government agencies and national armed groups.
It should be emphasized that the ethnic conflict in Transnistria was perceived as a struggle against “Romanianization,” and therefore this did not prevent the Russians, Ukrainians and Moldovans of Transnistria, who were supported by the Gagauz, from uniting.
The Transnistrian war somewhat cooled the hotheads in both Chisinau and Comrat.
During a protracted conflict with the Moldovan authorities, the Gagauzians obtained their consent to the special status of Gagauzia as part of United Moldova.
In December 1994, the Moldovan Parliament adopted the “Law on the Special Status of the Territory”, where the Gagauz, a Turkic-speaking people of Christian religion, live compactly. The law on the status of the southern peoples was adopted with the only, perhaps, serious amendment: the wording “national-territorial entity” was replaced with autonomous-territorial one. Arguments: along with the Gagauz, Bulgarians, Moldovans, Ukrainians and Russians live in the region. The villages where these nationalities predominate have yet to decide whether or not to be included in the already declared autonomous entity. The referendum was announced in 15 localities.
In accordance with the law, in the event of a change in the political status of Moldova itself (i.e. if it ever decides to join Romania), Gagauzia is guaranteed the right to external self-determination.
Currently, the law on the status of the southern regions has been adopted with the only, perhaps, serious amendment: the wording “national-territorial entity” has been replaced with an autonomous-territorial one.
It should be emphasized that the Gagauz autonomy is an Islam-dangerous zone in Moldova. It is known that throughout the entire period of negotiations on the status of this autonomy, Turkey and, to a lesser extent, Saudi Arabia showed extremely high interest in the problem.
Gagauzia is allowed to have its own national symbols, legislative assemblies operating within the framework of the Constitution of the republic. The official languages on its territory are Moldovan, Gagauz and Russian. It is believed that the outcome of the Gagauz issue is a model that can be transferred to Transnistria, negotiations on a special status for which are ongoing.
Mandate. The decision to send a long-term OSCE mission to Moldova was made on February 4, 1993. at the 19th meeting of the Committee of Senior Officials (currently the Governing Body). The Vienna Group of the Committee, at its 7th meeting on 11 March 1993, approved the mission's mandate, which outlined its objectives. According to it, the purpose of the mission is to facilitate the achievement of a lasting, comprehensive political settlement of the conflict in all its aspects. This meant preserving the territorial integrity of Moldova in combination with recognition of the special status of the Transnistrian region.
Among other tasks of the mission: developing agreements on the withdrawal of foreign troops; fulfillment of obligations regarding ethnic and national minorities; assisting in monitoring the implementation of agreements to achieve a lasting political settlement.
On May 7, 1993, a memorandum of understanding was signed with the government of Moldova, which determined the specific conditions for the mission’s activities on the territory of Moldova within the framework of its mandate. On August 25, 1993, after an exchange of letters between the heads of the mission and the President of the PMR Igor Smirnov, an agreement on the activities of the OSCE mission in the Transnistrian region of the Republic of Moldova came into force. The authorities of Moldova and Transnistria provided housing and work premises at the disposal of the mission in Chisinau and Tiraspol.
Meanwhile, having withdrawn four of the six peacekeeping battalions, Russia practically left two armies facing each other in the security zone. The Moldovan leadership considers the current layer in the Dniester zone insufficient to maintain peace and has requested an OSCE peacekeeping contingent. And Transnistria gradually introduced border troops into the security zone left by Russian soldiers. The Dniester becomes a clearly defined border.
Formally, the truce agreement is in force in the Transnistrian conflict zone, however, the key issue of the political status of the territory of Transnistria and its relationship with the central authorities has not yet been resolved.
It is important that, when declaring recognition of the independence of Moldova, members of the international community considered this state as existing within the borders of the former Moldavian SSR. The UN proceeded from the same principle when accepting Moldova into its ranks.
Secession (separation) based on violence, as well as the resulting state formations, cannot be justified by reference to geopolitical or any other interests. Violence, no matter how good intentions it may be hidden behind, inevitably leads to the undermining of stability, calls into question economic and social progress and ultimately contradicts the long-term interests of the state and the peoples inhabiting it. One involuntarily recalls an aphorism, the truth of which has been repeatedly confirmed by history: “A goal cannot be right, the achievement of which requires wrong means.”
Modern international law proceeds from the fact that peoples have the right to protection from any threat to their existence, to respect and development of their originality (self-identity), while any attempts at forced assimilation are inadmissible. However, to realize these rights, the creation of an independent mono-ethnic state or separation from historically established entities is not at all necessary. And in practice this is not always feasible. The entire experience of world development shows that the principle of “one people - one state” is often a hopeless illusion, since most ethnic groups, as a rule, are multi-layered (there are now over 2000 nations and large ethnic groups in the world, and the number of states does not even reach 200), and the focus on the priority of the interests and values of the titular ethnic group infringes on the rights of national minorities and comes into conflict with human rights.
At the same time, own statehood, broad independence within a single state, guaranteed by constitutional and other legislation, and, if necessary, by international authority, makes it possible to simultaneously satisfy the interests of the individual, the nation and the state, without violating its territorial integrity and without interfering with progressive integration processes .
Political settlement. The Memorandum on the principles of normalization of relations, signed on May 8, 1997 in Moscow in the presence of the Presidents of the Russian Federation and Ukraine Boris Yeltsin, Leonid Kuchma and the leadership of the OSCE, recognizes Moldova as a single state, including the self-proclaimed Transnistrian Republic. However, it states that the division of powers and the status of the Pridnestrovians will still need to be agreed upon.
Since then, meetings between the two presidents have been held regularly, they talk a lot, and usually break up after midnight, but no significant changes are visible. Basically, mutual claims are being sorted out - those that accumulated in the past and those that arose after the signing of the memorandum. Unable to convince each other at the negotiating table, each side proves its case "on the economic field."
The signing of the memorandum was preceded by lengthy and intricate diplomatic maneuvers by the parties and mediators. These maneuvers reflected both the requesting positions of the parties and the general trend in the development of the situation, which was that, on the one hand, Tiraspol’s hopes for international legal recognition of its “rebel republic” were fading every day, and on the other hand, Chisinau’s confidence remained that “abroad will help us” and that the separatists themselves are about to lay down their arms.
Under these conditions, the main opponent of the settlement program document - the leadership of Transnistria - began to change its position and, since 1996, practically insisted on signing the memorandum. “We,” commented on Tiraspol’s position on this issue Speaker of the Transnistrian Parliament Grigory Marakutsa - indeed, at first they opposed the idea of a memorandum, since it contradicts our popularly approved Constitution, which declared Transnistria an independent state.
However, in accordance with the memorandum, Moldova and Transnistria are subjects of a common state. And these are different things. Overcoming this difference was not easy for us. The secret of the “compliance” of Transnistrian diplomacy was revealed very simply.
The text of the memorandum included Article 3, stating that “Transnistria takes part in the implementation of the foreign policy of the Republic of Moldova, a subject of international law, on issues affecting its interests. Decisions on these issues are made by agreement of the parties.” This statement practically brought Pridnestrovie out of diplomatic oblivion and made it possible to legally demand the participation of its representatives in the discussion of all issues related to the region at all international forums, including the OSCE.
Chisinau undoubtedly saw the danger of this text and came up with an appropriate “antidote” in the form of a joint statement signed simultaneously with the participation of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office by the presidents of the Russian Federation and Ukraine, which confirmed that the provisions of the memorandum cannot be interpreted in contradiction with the principle of the territorial integrity of the Republic of Moldova. A corresponding provision was included in the text of Article 11, according to which “the parties will build their relations within the framework of a common state within the borders of the Moldavian SSR as of January 1990” (emphasis added - A.Ya.).
Meshcherin agreements. At the end of September 1997, a meeting between Pyotr Luchinsky and Igor Smirnov took place, which ended with the signing of a protocol containing a number of important points for the settlement process. An agreement was reached to hold regular (once a month) meetings of the leaders of Moldova and Transnistria, to prepare joint steps to reduce tensions and military confrontation in the security zone, and on a new round of negotiations at the expert level on the project interim document on the delimitation of jurisdiction and mutual delegation of powers between Chisinau and Tiraspol.
As a result of the subsequent negotiations in the village of Meshcherino near Moscow (October 6-10, 1997), the parties, with the help of mediators, managed to agree on a draft interim agreement (the so-called Meshcherin document) to resolve the conflict, which was supposed to be signed during the CIS summit in Chisinau on October 23. However, the Pridnestrovian side at the last moment abandoned the previously reached agreements and disavowed the signatures of its representatives.
The latest example of this is the “customs war” that broke out from the beginning of February 1998 on the banks of the Dniester. Chisinau introduced excise taxes on goods traveling to Transnistria, which further aggravated its already difficult economic situation. In response, Igor Smirnov took “adequate measures” and ordered the collection of duties on goods traveling to Moldova from the CIS countries through the left bank of the Dniester and, in addition, reduced the supply of electricity by 20% “for unrepaid debts.” All this forces us to seek compromises, postponing the solution of the main political task until later.
As evidenced by the next meeting in February 1998 between the President of Moldova Petr Lucinsky and the leader of the PMR Igor Smirnov in Chisinau, it ended with the signing of five documents on establishing economic ties, which allows us to talk about some rapprochement of positions.
Ukraine is interested in stabilizing the Southwestern geopolitical space, which is an area of its vital interests.
Odessa agreements. Subsequently, truly titanic efforts were made to get the flywheel of negotiations out of the deadlock. Central to these efforts was the quadrilateral (Moldova, Transnistria, Russia, Ukraine) Odessa meeting on the Transnistrian settlement on March 19-20, 1998. During this meeting, important agreements were reached and documents were signed to strengthen confidence-building measures between the parties to the conflict, as well as Attempts have been made to resolve military-property issues related to the presence of the Joint Group of Russian Forces (OGRF) on the territory of the Republic of Moldova.
The documents signed on March 20, 1998, during a working meeting of the presidents of Ukraine, Moldova, the head of the Russian government and the head of Transnistria, were the agreement “On confidence-building measures and the development of contacts between Moldova and Transnistria” and the protocol “On some priority steps to intensify the regulation of the Transnistrian problem” .
The agreement “On confidence-building events and the development of contacts between the Republic of Moldova and Transnistria” is important not only for the regions, but also for the entire European continent. This was announced at a joint meeting of the participants in the Odessa meeting by Leonid Kuchma, who, together with the Prime Minister of the Russian Federation, represents the guarantors in the peaceful resolution of the problem.
According to the agreement, the parties agreed to reduce the composition of the peacekeeping forces of Moldova and Transnistria to 500 military personnel on each side with headquarters military equipment and weapons within two months. There are currently more than 2,000 peacekeeping forces based in the region.
The meeting participants pledged to facilitate the removal of excessive Russian property from Transnistria as soon as possible. Ukraine expressed its readiness to ensure its transit through its territory. The number of checkpoints and border posts will also be reduced. They will be replaced by mobile patrols, and this will greatly simplify the movement of both people and goods. A plan has also been proposed for the construction of a road bridge across the Dniester River near the city of Dubossary by May 1 of this year.
A proposal was received to introduce Ukrainian observers to Transnistria.
The Prime Minister of the Russian Federation and the leader of Transnistria Igor Smirnov signed on March 20, 1998 a protocol of agreements on military and property issues. The weapons located by Russian troops in Transnistria have been accumulating there for decades. According to the agreement reached, all weapons belonging to Russian peacekeepers in Transnistria will be divided into three parts: the first group includes weapons, ammunition and property of a group of Russian troops, which will remain intact, the second will consist of military equipment subject to unconditional export to the territory of the Russian Federation, and the third will include surplus weapons, which can either be destroyed on site or sold. The Russian Federation and Transnistria will share the proceeds from their sales equally. The Pridnestrovian side undertakes not to create obstacles to the export of Russian weapons.
According to A. Adamishin, who continues to serve as Minister for Cooperation of the Russian Federation with the CIS countries, “the meeting was productive, the attempt to “push” the process of a peaceful settlement in Transnistria was a success.”
Moldova is interested in replacing Russian peacekeeping forces with Ukrainian peacekeeping contingent. After all, it is known that Russia uses the peacekeeping contingent and the 14th Army located there to strengthen its geopolitical influence in the region. The transfer of peacekeeping functions to the 14th Army since the summer of 1996 has significantly strengthened the position of the Pridnestrovian side. According to independent experts, by mid-1993, with the help of the 14th Russian Army, the formation of the armed forces of Transnistria was completed, 70% of which were stationed in the security zone in violation of the agreement. At the same time, more than 52% of the soldiers and sergeants of the 14th Army are recruited from the local population of Transnistria, which casts doubt on the ability of the Russian contingent to maintain neutrality when performing peacekeeping functions.
The documents signed in Odessa did not completely solve the problem, since the most important question about the future status of Transnistria remained unresolved.
Tiraspol defends the right to recognition of the statehood of the region with a special international status, but within the common borders of the former Moldavian SSR. This means - your government, your parliament and all the attributes of statehood: coat of arms, anthem, flag, etc.
Bosnia is given as an example of such an entity. The experience of the Bosnian settlement did not become a role model in Odessa, but the meeting participants mentioned it as a “possible model” in the search for the political status of Transnistria.
The population of Transnistria, after the end of the conflict, sees its destiny in defending its interests. Residents of the Right Bank are more pessimistic, settled among Moldovans, they feel pushing factors: the proclamation of the language of the titular nationality as the only language in the republic, the adoption of a citizenship law that deprived many Russians and Ukrainians of any prospects, a decline in professions that prevail among the Slavic population, a surge in self-awareness titular nation.
Surveys have shown that the Russian-speaking population of Moldova believes that the emergence of interstate relations and a political and legal way of solving the problem will be a significant obstacle to potential migration.
Kyiv agreements. Later, however, the “Odessa initiatives” began to fade away. In July 1999, it was replaced by the “Kiev impulse” - a high-level meeting in Kyiv (July 16), at which provisions on a single defense, legal, economic and cultural space were finally agreed upon. However, the OSCE Istanbul Summit stated in November 1999 the absence of “tangible progress on the main issue - determining the status of the Transnistrian region.
Visit of the President of Moldova to Ukraine. On May 18, 2001, the President of the Republic of Moldova Vladimir Voronin arrived in Ukraine on an official visit today.
At the airport, the Moldovan head of state was met by Foreign Minister Anatoly Zlenko and other officials. At the airport, V. Voronin said: “We have the intention to build our relations with Ukraine extremely seriously, especially because there is a very large Ukrainian diaspora in Moldova.” He also noted that the Moldovan side has already prepared a package of future joint agreements.
The visit program included negotiations between the two Presidents, after which Ukrainian-Moldovan negotiations will take place in an expanded format.
Based on their results, it was planned to sign joint documents, as well as a press conference of heads of state.
A meeting is planned between Vladimir Voronin and the Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine I. Plyuschiy and Prime Minister V. Yushchenko. During his stay in Ukraine, the President of Moldova visited the mint, the Kiev-Pechersk historical and cultural reserve, and inspected the exhibition center of the village. Chubynske (Kyiv region). Let us recall that shortly before his visit to Ukraine, V. Voronin, in an interview with the Japanese newspaper Sankei Shimbun, stated that he considers Russia a strategic ally and sees his government’s main task as “bringing Moldovan-Russian relations to a new stage.” “We completely import minerals from Russia, and 70% of Moldova’s foreign trade comes from Russia,” explained Vladimir Voronin. According to him, by 2007 Russia and Belarus will form a “single economic space,” but Moldova is also “interested in joining such a union from an economic point of view.” “Thanks to this, we hope to receive energy resources from these two countries, especially oil and gas, at prices below world prices,” said the Moldovan president. Voronin also noted that Moldova should study the experience of reforms carried out by the Chinese Communist Party.
Chisinau and Tiraspol are cunningly refusing to sign an agreement on a comprehensive political settlement. Chisinau is ready to recognize Transnistria’s right to autonomy within a single state; Tiraspol, like Sukhumi in the case of Georgia, insists on the equal personality of the parties, i.e., from a legal point of view, on the confederal nature of the future single state. In any case, the most important problem in the Transnistrian issue has not been resolved - this is the problem associated with Pridnestrovie’s recognition of itself as part of the Republic of Moldova, which the PMR will not resolve today. In fact, this means that by the beginning of 2003 the parties were essentially as far from an agreement as at the very beginning of the conflict in 1990. The myth that the Transnistrian conflict is close to an end is nothing more than a myth. In this respect, it is no different from other so-called frozen conflicts in the post-Soviet space.
Ukraine and Russia are for resolving the conflict. Russia, Ukraine and the OSCE, which are mediators in the Transnistrian settlement process, intend in the near future to transfer to the leadership of Moldova and Transnistria the package of compromise proposals and recommendations they have developed for resolving the Transnistrian conflict.
The head of the OSCE mission to Moldova, William Hill, told reporters in Chisinau.
According to him, this document was prepared during September and October 2003. It contains compromise proposals to resolve issues related to the government structure of the future federal state, the division of powers between Chisinau and Tiraspol, as well as some security guarantees in the reintegrated Moldova.
The head of the OSCE mission to Moldova expressed hope that these proposals will help intensify the negotiation process between Chisinau and Tiraspol and find the best option for a final solution to the Transnistrian issue. Moldova and Transnistria are on the verge of creating a new federal state.
Kozak's plan. On November 20, 2003, the leaders of Moldova and Transnistria received from the Russian Foreign Ministry a new Memorandum (plan) for resolving the Transnistrian conflict. The essence of the Russian peacekeeping plan involves the transformation of Moldova into a federal state with two federal subjects - the Transnistrian Republic and Gagauzia. What is fundamentally new is that a detailed settlement plan has been proposed with the presentation of specific provisions that regulate in sufficient detail the design of the future federal state.
The plan included:
- the creation of an asymmetric federation in which there will be two subjects - Transnistria and Gagauzia;
- creation of a bicameral parliament;
- introduction of a transitional provision until 2015;
- “complete demilitarization of the future state” while maintaining Russian peacekeeping forces in the region for the entire period of demilitarization of the conflict zone;
- giving the Russian language the status of a state language (Kozak saw the origins of the conflict in “violation of the interests of the Russian-speaking population”);
- representation of Transnistria in political system a new federation on parity with Moldova.
According to the plan, after the final agreement on the provisions of the plan, an agreement was to be signed on November 25-26, 2003 between Moldova and the Transnistrian Republic on the settlement of the conflict that had lasted 13 years.
However, Russia has developed a plan within the framework of a five-party format of negotiations to resolve the conflict with the participation of the main stakeholders - Chisinau and Tiraspol, as well as security guarantors - the OSCE, Russia and Ukraine. But in lately In the West, claims have arisen that the conflict is being resolved without the participation of the European Union and Moldova’s neighbor, Romania. Therefore, disagreements have emerged among OSCE experts regarding Russia’s plan to resolve the Transnistrian problem.
Reference. On November 24, 2003, the OSCE Secretariat in Vienna, Mr. De Hoop Scheffer, stated his position, stating: “The OSCE does not approve of Russia’s plans regarding Moldova, however, if the parties do come to an agreement in accordance with the plan proposed by Russia, the OSCE will take a neutral position.” That is, the OSCE leaves the resolution of this issue to the Moldovan people. Also, a number of OSCE member countries are “seriously concerned about the lack of clarity in the proposed division of power between central and regional authorities. But if the parties reach an agreement, the OSCE is ready to continue cooperation with both sides in the process of developing both a new Constitution and to assist in the preparation of a national democratic referendum so that the Moldovan people can express their will regarding the future of their divided country.
Experts draw attention to the fact that the settlement of the Transnistrian issue is hampered by the conflict of interests of external forces and local politicians seeking to receive their political dividends at that very moment, more than ever before, Moldova was so close to the beginning of a full-scale settlement of the Transnistrian problem.
The plan proposed by Russia is the result of a real compromise between the parties. The principles of an asymmetric federation and the mechanisms for the functioning of democratic institutions laid down in the project are extremely suitable for the Republic of Moldova. But the adoption of documents of such strategic importance cannot be carried out in the presence of opposition from any side.
The course chosen by Moldova towards European integration determines the inevitable approval of the proposed settlement plan by European structures, and first of all the OSCE. This is necessary, first of all, so that the European future of the Moldovan state can never be called into question by anyone.
Therefore, in such conditions, the leadership of Moldova considered it premature to sign the plan without coordinating its provisions with European organizations.
Experts also note the positive side of this plan as it gave impetus to the export process Russian weapons from Transnistria. It was necessary to export 50 echelons of weapons within 6-7 months (at the rate of 1-2 echelons per week).
It seems that the experience now being applied in Moldova, the developed conflict resolution methodology can be useful in other conflict zones in the CIS and beyond. It is possible that the resolution of the Georgian-Karabakh conflict and the settlement of the Georgian problem may develop according to a similar plan.
Today, in the security zone, stretching along the Dniester for 225 km and 12-24 km wide, peacekeepers are busy preventing provocations, preventing the actions of illegal armed and bandit groups, suppressing the transit of weapons, ammunition and drugs, ensuring law and order. The security zone is divided into three sections: northern, central, southern. This was done at the first stage when stopping the armed conflict for ease of management, since military commandant’s offices were created in each zone. And within this zone, at the first stage, more than 40 peacekeeping posts were placed on the main transport routes, roads that were in and out of the security zone, and on all bridges within the security zone.
Hydroelectric dams, pontoon crossings and high security zones were also under control. Currently, due to the fact that the volume of tasks performed by peacekeeping forces has decreased, by decision of the Joint Control Commission (the political superstructure in a peacekeeping operation operating on a permanent basis, which includes representatives of Transnistria, Moldova, Russia, Ukraine and the OSCE.) the number posts and checkpoints have been reduced to 15. 8 of them are located in the central section and 7 in the southern section. Plus, there are military commandant’s offices in the cities of Dubossary and Bendery.
Despite the political demarches on both sides of the Dniester, the stabilization of the situation made it possible to significantly reduce the peacekeeping contingents of the parties. Today, more than 1,000 military personnel from Russia, Moldova and Transnistria serve in the security zone.
Meeting of Presidents. On April 22, 2005, the presidents of Georgia Mikheil Saakashvili, Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko, Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and Moldova Vladimir Voronin met in Chisinau. The leader of Uzbekistan, Islam Karimov, did not attend, but a representative of that country participated as an observer. The presidents of Romania and Lithuania, Traian Basescu and Valdas Adamkus, also arrived in Chisinau as observers. The leader of Poland, Kwasniewski, who was expected the day before, did not arrive. Saakashvili handed over the reins of the GUUAM chairmanship to Voronin.
Ukrainian President Yushchenko proposed a number of new initiatives designed to resolve the Transnistrian problem, the so-called “road map”.
Reference.“Road map” is a copy of the concept of road map - an Anglo-American term from the field of management - an analogue of the Soviet “perspective plan”. In a political context recent years the term road map appears as a “resolution plan”, a list of actions to overcome a crisis, proposed by third-party (UN, and more often American) “crisis managers” where they often helped create it in the first place.
The plan contains 7 steps, among other things, concerning the proposals of the Administration of Transnistria to create conditions for the development of democracy; about holding elections to the Supreme Council in the near future; about the possibility of involving the EU, OSCE, Council of Europe, Russia, the USA and other democratic countries and international entities. Together with Ukraine, they must ensure control over free elections. They also discussed the possibility of transforming the international military presence on the territory of the PMR, and the possibility of admitting monitoring missions to military enterprises.
In response, Voronin cautiously noted that such initiatives require “careful and comprehensive study.” In turn, the Romanian leader Basescu did not comment on the Kyiv initiatives, but proposed to include Romania in the negotiation process. Analyzing the situation in the self-proclaimed republics of Transnistria, Abkhazia, South Ossetia and Nagorno-Karabakh and the prospects for the peaceful resolution of conflicts, the participants in the Chisinau meeting demonstrated complete unity in their assessments. Thus, the format of the peace process, which has been dominated by Russia since the early 90s, needs to be changed by involving “new world players” - the USA and the EU. Azerbaijani President Aliyev was more cautious: “The cave approach to their settlement has no prospects. We must find civilized mechanisms to solve these problems."
Georgian President Saakashvili was incomparable and eloquent in the fight against totalitarianism and upholding democratic values. In his speech at the summit, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili complained that in today's Belarus there is “no democracy and freedom.” “We are far from demanding the replacement of individual leaders; this is a matter for the people themselves,” Saakashvili said. But the Belarusian people “have the right to free choice,” the Georgian president emphasized.
It is clear that the laurels of the winner of the revolution do not allow him to calm down. It seems that he decided that he had already led Georgia to a bright democratic future and it was time to roll up his sleeves and spread his “advanced” experience to other states in which the unfortunate peoples are literally eking out a miserable existence without freedom and democracy in the Saakashvili style. Let the Belarusian people now know that in distant Georgia the president’s soul hurts for his difficult undemocratic lot and he is already ready for a harsh struggle for his bright future... Although, by and large, Saakashvili would be worth learning from Belarus, which, both in terms of growth rates and standard of living, not to mention the social security of the population, has far surpassed its “caring” critics.
At the end of the summit, the Declaration “In the name of democracy, stability and development” was signed.
As Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko stated at the final press conference, “GUUAM from an informal institution is becoming a formal body that will have its own secretariat, its own structure of working bodies, established goals for its activities, as well as regulated financing issues.”
President of Ukraine V. Yushchenko, who had previously rejected supranational bodies in the SES, proposed creating joint GUUAM armed forces and supranational bodies financed from the Ukrainian budget.
Unfortunately, already on May 5, 2005, the leadership of Uzbekistan sent a notification to the chairman of the GUUAM organization (Georgia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, Moldova), President of Moldova Vladimir Voronin, about its withdrawal from the organization. This decision was made following the results of the GUUAM summit in Chisinau, in which Uzbekistan refused to participate due to the fact that GUUAM had turned into a “political organization.”
Since Uzbekistan left the organization, it automatically turned into GUAM, that is, Georgia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan and Moldova remain in the current composition of the organization.
Elections in the PMR. The parliamentary elections that took place on December 11, 2005 in Transnistria had a serious impact not only on the internal political development of the PMR, not only on the course of the dialogue between the unrecognized republic and Chisinau, but also on the balance of power in the post-Soviet space. Elections to the Transnistrian parliament took place according to a majoritarian system. 179 candidates competed for 43 seats in parliament.
And although many candidates were nominated by parties and social movements, it was actually people, not parties, who competed. In addition, the number of voters from whom a deputy is elected is relatively small - 8-10 thousand.
According to the Central Election Commission of the Republic, voter turnout was more than 46%. This means that the elections can be considered valid, since this requires a turnout of 25% of voters.
The authorities of Moldova, Ukraine, the European Union, the OSCE, which in advance declared the elections to the Transnistrian parliament “undemocratic” (obviously confusing the democracy of the electoral process with the international legitimacy of the territory in which the elections are taking place), not only “lost” the elections, but also to a greater extent destroyed their authority in the eyes of Pridnestrovians. Moreover, by refusing to send observers, they cut themselves off from the opportunity to give any assessment of this process.
Although the OSCE ignored the last parliamentary elections in the republic, the new electoral code of the PMR provides for the mandatory presence of an “against all” clause on the ballot and a clear procedure for recalling a deputy. The chairman of the election commission of any level is obliged (!) to sign all drawn up acts of violations.
For Ukraine, which the Pridnestrovians had traditionally previously perceived as an insufficiently reliable, but still friendly force, such a position looks extremely erroneous from the point of view of its position in the region. In Transnistria, Ukraine's position was regarded as "treasonous."
So, elections were held in Transnistria, which, according to observers, correspond to international democratic standards. The elections strengthened internal political stability in the PMR. The efforts of the PMR and Russia to legitimize these elections were crowned with success. In the negotiations on the Transnistrian settlement, Tiraspol gains a stronger negotiating position. In the PMR, the authority of European structures, Moldova and Ukraine has fallen.
Escalation of the conflict (March 2006). The aggravation of the situation between Tiraspol and Chisinau occurred after, at the request of Moldova, Ukraine, the President of Ukraine was Yushchenko, introduced a customs regime on March 3, according to which all Transnistrian cargo must undergo Moldovan customs clearance. Thus, the unrecognized Republic of Transnistria actually found itself in economic isolation.
Let me remind you that the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, on March 1, 2006, issued order No. 112-r: “Issues of customs registration of goods and vehicles that are imported to Ukraine from the Republic of Moldova.” .
The decision followed from a customs agreement between Ukraine and Moldova, which was signed on December 30, 2005, under which Ukraine agreed to recognize only Moldavian – and not Transnistrian – customs documents. The joint Ukrainian-Transnistrian commission was supposed to decide the fate of Transnistria's customs declarations, but on March 1 the Ukrainian side left without explanation. As a result, two days later the border was closed to the transport of goods originating from Transnistria.
Ukrainian Prime Minister Yuri Yekhanurov called it a “self-imposed blockade. “In his opinion, Transnistria should simply clear his cargo at the customs of Moldova. To do this, they would have to re-register their economic agents in Moldova rather than in Transnistria, which would require economic agents to then pay 20% VAT on all export activities (Transnistria, by contrast, does not impose VAT or export taxes on its products).
It can be argued that with this measure, Moldova and Ukraine destroyed the settlement negotiations and significantly worsened the opportunities for peaceful, constructive transformation involving Transnistria.
NGOs as an element of pressure. Here, an important role was played by NGOs that served as pressure groups, and were funded by the Soros Foundation and were represented by Ukraine: Institute for Euro-Atlantic Cooperation, Romania: Center for Conflict Prevention and Early Warning, Moldova: Institute of Public Policy, which prepared the “Tripartite Plan to Solve the Problem” Transnistria" (IEAC Ukraine, IPP Moldova, CCPEW Romania), published on February 4, 2006.
The project was carried out with the support of the East-East Program: partnership beyond borders international fund Renaissance, Soros Foundation in Moldova and Open Society Foundation, Romania. The publication in Russian was carried out with the assistance of the Carnegie Moscow Center.
Initially, these groups discussed the uncompromising Romanian idea of a Cuban-style trade embargo against Transnistria. The plans were kept secret from the OSCE and EU - and US observers; only two government “negotiators” were aware of them: Oazu Nantoi from the IPP in Moldova and his colleague Boris Tarasyuk from the IEAC in Ukraine. Between these two organizations, the outline of a bilateral Moldovan-Ukrainian intergovernmental agreement was created for signature on December 30, 2005, stipulating that all cargo imported and exported from Transnistria could cross the Ukrainian border only with Moldovan customs documents.
After its scheduled implementation on January 25, wiser heads prevailed: Ukraine sensibly suspended it, arguing that its implementation should be delayed. This led to terrible turmoil in the private, unaccountable network of pressure groups, and it was decided that more pressure was needed, this time in the form of a policy of "recommendations" to be made by someone from the network - Boris Tarasyuk (more below) of the IEAC .
It is interesting that the text of this “Tripartite Plan for Solving the Transnistria Problem” was created privately by the self-called “Group of Experts of Moldova-Ukraine-Romania”, a private group made up of typical specialists in Eastern European politics, working for hire, who earn good money for a living, receiving money from Soros and as many grants as possible from the West (The name Soros appears five times in the document, the cover of which also bears the emblem “East-East Project.”). This work did not have among its authors government officials of any of these three countries; thus ensuring falsifiability and ignoring the need for fact-checking or any accountability at all towards the voters of these three countries.
When you open the document, you see only self-proclaimed “experts” who did not even bother to invite representatives of Transnistria to participate in the work, but Romania was represented, although it is neither a participant in the problem nor a state bordering Transnistria.
This document used unfounded language of escalation, citing its causes as "increasing urgency" (but only a general statement, and no explanation as to why) in the "fight against terrorism, illegal trade weapons, smuggling and drug and human trafficking (No evidence cited to support these serious allegations or any other fictitious transgressions on the part of Transnistria.)" - in short, this is now a common scare tactic, of which there are numerous examples condemned by the OSCE and EU officials as simply inappropriate, and which are always presented without any evidence. It is interesting that Ambassador William Hill, head of the OSCE mission to Moldova, said at a press conference in Chisinau.
15 May 2006 that EUBAM - the EU Border Assistance Mission during its first six months of the two-year program did not reveal any involvement of Transnistria in arms or drug smuggling. Hill acknowledged the unfoundedness of Moldovan accusations against Transnistria, adding that EUBAM's work demonstrated that "such allegations are exaggerated."
The document demanded “strict compliance” by Ukraine with the regime and instructions of “border and customs control, trade and economic relations with enterprises and firms” of Transnistria, and indicated to Ukraine that it was necessary to “implement without any further delay the bilateral Agreement of the Republic of Moldova - Ukraine of December 30, 2005 on imports /export of goods from Transnistria across the border, unilaterally suspended at noon on the day of its entry into force,” and “terminate commercial relations with firms and agents” located in Transnistria.
The report did not bother to mention international law, but instead explicitly hinted at new customs measures introduced simply as a political pressure: “The largest Transnistrian companies (in particular Scheriff) are likely to suffer significant losses. ”
It was less clear that these new circumstances would lead to anything other than the vague promise that the measure "might encourage local politicians to adopt a more flexible position and encourage compromise."
Now, having had the chance to look back, and having paid a high price for such an exercise in scorched earth diplomacy, Ukraine is justified in asking: was the intended result achieved?
Objectively speaking, this measure had the exact opposite effect; a veritable diplomatic calamity that left parties on both sides petrified, made their positions more inflexible, wrecked the chances of a settlement, caused the two main parties to walk away from the negotiating table, and caused irreparable damage to any hopes that may have existed about the possibility of finding a friendly solutions with mutual benefit.
It is interesting that in the preparation of the report in the section “Transnistrian conflict - review”, issues of the armed conflict in Transnistria were ignored, as if there were no military operations of the Moldovan regular army against the population of the Transnistria region, there was no massacre in Bendery on June 19-20, 1992, when the dead did not have time to be buried, but were loaded into refrigerators. The truth in such studies is often one-sided, precisely reflecting the interests of the customer. Not the least role was played by Boris Tarasyuk, director of the Institute of Euro-Atlantic Cooperation (concurrently the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine). In his private role, he accepts dollar donations from Western influence-seeking groups for a private institute that he personally founded. Even more privately, he is known as a contactee for a network of small and shadowy Romanophilia interest groups based in Bucharest, Romania and Chisinau, Moldova. These groups are pursuing policies that are in conflict with the interests of Ukraine, but are not in conflict with the personal interests of Boris Tarasyuk, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine.
Tarasyuk is the founder of IEAC, a political pressure group created primarily to push Ukraine towards NATO and membership in the European Union, which he has done regularly since appearing in the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine
However, in the Ukrainian parliamentary elections, Yushchenko's ruling party suffered a stunning defeat: it came third, receiving less than 14% of the vote. (23)
During his tenure in the Ukrainian cabinet, Boris Tarasyuk often used his private pressure group to campaign for policy changes, which he then, as foreign minister, implemented as public policy. In one such example, this group co-authored a report recommending Resolution 112, and less than four weeks after its publication, the resolution was in effect - just before the parliamentary elections and while Tarasyuk was still in office. This is an example of diplomacy being misused to worsen rather than improve relations between two growing antagonists.
With the election results now counted and the will of the people of Ukraine clear to all, neutral observers may wonder whether the time has come to reconsider Ukraine's policies in relations with its neighbors.
This is the test of democracy in Ukraine: will the government fulfill the true wishes of the people of Ukraine? Or is it a shadow business as usual, where a shadow Politburo of foreign-funded close friends makes political decisions for closed doors that go against the free democratic wishes of voters?
On the contrary, the Party of Regions with the most realistic approach to Transnistria was rewarded by voters - making it the winner of the elections. Viktor Yanukovych became the first person in the modern history of Ukraine who twice managed to enter the cabinet of the prime minister as the owner (there was, however, Vitaliy Masol, but for the first time he headed the Cabinet of Ministers, then called the Council of Ministers, back under Soviet power) and became the head The 13th government in 15 years of independence.
The biggest loser is Ukraine, both politically and financially. Analysts in Ukraine, as well as abroad, agree that the measures against Transnistria are costing the government popularity and have cost Ukraine millions every week in lost revenue.
Hundreds of cars with cargo accumulated at border checkpoints on the Transnistrian side, dozens of enterprises were stopped in the region, and protests of many thousands took place. Tiraspol states that the new rules have led to the shutdown of a number of enterprises and losses of $46.2 million, which increase daily by an average of $5 million. Russian enterprises cooperating with Moldovan industry also suffered losses.
US and EU pressure. Let us recall that Ukraine committed itself not to allow Transnistrian goods to pass through without Moldovan customs documents back in May 2005. Then Petro Poroshenko, who served as Secretary of the Security Council, was able to delay the introduction of tough measures. Ukraine also evaded pressure on Tiraspol in December 205. However, this time the pressure from Brussels and Washington turned out to be too strong: the EU and the USA began to take the data on the pre-election ratings of Ukrainian parties more seriously, and so far a government completely loyal to Yushchenko is in power , decided to involve Kyiv in the pressure on Transnistria.
The focus was on preparing a kind of color revolution in the unrecognized republic. This year, special courses will open in Moldova, the participants of which will be fifteen non-governmental organizations from Transnistria. All expenses are covered by the Soros Foundation. The main goal: to include Pridnestrovian civil society in the public life of Moldova. Several organizations, about which no one has heard anything in Tiraspol, recently contacted the OSCE with a demand to replace Russian peacekeepers with an international contingent. The head of the OSCE mission, William Hill, immediately stated that “the public wants replacement of the peacekeepers.”
Destabilization in the region benefits, first of all, the West:
Firstly, because in the event of the outbreak of an armed conflict, it is Russia that can be blamed for its inability to maintain peace in the conflict zone;
secondly, Instead of Russian peacekeepers, NATO peacekeeping forces will come to the region, which have long planned the development of this space.
And the conclusion is simple: Moldova, in this case, gets the opportunity, with the forceful assistance of NATO troops, to subjugate the rebellious region. For Ukraine, the benefit of the aggravation is also obvious - many ethnic Ukrainians live in Transnistria, who, “under the guise of the blockade,” were illegally deprived of the right to vote, which they gave for V.F. Yanukovych in the 2004 presidential elections. During the 2006 parliamentary elections, the Central Election Commission did not open a single polling station in Transnistria - obviously, Kyiv understands that the political preferences of Ukrainian Transnistrians have not changed. Because even with the help of Russia, it is difficult for Pridnestrovie to resist in the self-isolation regime. Tiraspol hopes that the Cabinet of Ministers formed by the Party of Regions will change its attitude towards Transnistria.
As we see, there is a struggle for geopolitical dominance, and the last foothold of the Slavs is Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Transnistria.
For now, time is on the side of the PMR. Ukraine, Moldova, Romania and Western countries, on the contrary, are in a hurry.
A big diplomatic game has begun. Washington would like to get rid of the unrecognized republics in the post-Soviet space in favor of its allies (Moldova, Georgia, Azerbaijan) before Kosovo’s independence is recognized, so that this analogy would be inappropriate.
Moscow, on the contrary, will insist on the appropriateness of such an analogy in order to achieve recognition of the independence of Transnistria, Abkhazia, South Ossetia and Nagorno-Karabakh. Ukraine could have benefited greatly from this diplomatic battle, but it was unable to play an independent role.
After March 26, 2006, this romantic and conflict-ridden page of Ukrainian history was turned over.
An interesting fact is that communist President Vladimir Voronin completely abandoned his promises made to voters in 2001, declaring in 2005 that he was committed to the reunification of Moldova with Romania. Apparently, by doing so, Voronin expects to “enter the EU”, since Romania will become Europe in 2007. But Transnistria interferes with Moldova in this regard, this is obvious and served as a reason for the conflict, which is clearly aimed at the reintegration of the PMR into Moldova.
Let's add to this the undermining of Transnistrian confidence in Ukraine, a serious blow to bilateral trade relations with Tiraspol, participation on the side of Moldova and, ultimately, Romania in the economic subordination of this Russian-Ukrainian enclave at the gates of Europe.
However, until recently, all attempts to launch a large-scale attack on the independence of the PMR were blocked by the economic independence of the region. In terms of industrial production, the PMR, barely visible on the map, is comparable to the whole of Moldova. A significant part of all goods produced was exported, ensuring a constant flow of money into the republic.
According to a 1997 memorandum signed by Tiraspol, Chisinau, Moscow and Kiev, the foreign economic activity of the unrecognized republic was not limited by anyone. Transnistrian goods went both to Ukraine and to Russia and other countries.
An interesting position is taken by the region’s leadership, which views the presence of Russian capital as a guarantee of maintaining the status quo in Transnistria (since 1992, Transnistria has de facto lived independently of Moldova, although de jure it is its integral part). The increased interest of Russian business people Let us also explain to Transnistria - at the wide sale that is announced here, you can always buy a worthwhile object for almost nothing. So in your own way Moldavskaya GRES was sold at the time: it went to the first buyer for $20 million, although it is now valued at $150 million.
For example, the Moldavskaya State District Power Plant, located on the territory of Transnistria, was sold to a subsidiary of RAO UES of Russia - Inter RAO. This power plant is capable of providing electricity not only to the whole of Moldova, but also to a number of other countries. Just the other day, the Moldavian Metallurgical Plant (MMZ), located in the city of Rybnitsa, became the property of a Russian investor. A controlling stake in the best plant in Europe (among enterprises of its class) was bought by Ural Steel (owner - Russian businessman Alisher Usmanov). Before this, the owner of the MMZ, which covers 30% of the Transnistrian budget, was the Metallurgical Union of Ukraine. 90% of the plant's exports go to Western countries. In addition, the Russians bought such Transnistrian enterprises as the Buket Moldavii winery, the Bendery silk factory, the Floare shoe factory, the Pribor plant, which produces weapons, and others. About a hundred industrial facilities remained non-privatized, including the Transnistrian power grid and the famous KVINT cognac factory.
Therefore, we can assume that it is the Russians who will soon become the owners of the part of the Transnistrian state property that has not yet been bought up.
Thus, a situation has arisen where Chisinau needs Transnistria as a developed and successful part of the country, but Transnistria was in no way interested in reunification with agrarian Moldova, which constantly challenges Albania’s primacy in the list of the poorest countries in Europe. At the same time, we should not forget that the PMR has developed its own political and economic elite, which has absolutely no desire to share power or money with Chisinau. And this would be an inevitable consequence of a possible unification.
Abkhazia, South Ossetia and Pridnestrovie signed a declaration on joint actions. The leaders of the three unrecognized republics - Abkhazia, South Ossetia and Transnistria - signed a joint declaration on Wednesday, June 15, 2006, at a trilateral meeting in Sukhumi general principles relations and a statement on the inadmissibility of changing the format of peacekeeping operations in conflict zones.
Both documents were signed by the heads of the unrecognized republics - Abkhazia, South Ossetia and Transnistria - Sergei Bagapsh, Eduard Kokoity and Igor Smirnov. They announced that they would stop acting in silos and move towards joint action to achieve common goals.
The document notes that “the Community being created is not directed against third states or international organizations and associations.” Abkhazia, Transnistria and South Ossetia proclaimed the creation of the Community “For Democracy and the Rights of Peoples”. Its main goals:
- completion of the collapse of the USSR through international recognition of the three republics; achieving common goals through peaceful means and political methods;
- creation of favorable conditions for the development of the economy of the republics in the name of the well-being and prosperity of their peoples; preservation and development of the cultural, national and territorial identity of the peoples of the three republics.
The declaration emphasizes that the unrecognized republics intend to achieve independence through referendums, as " highest form democracy”, but also “to continue negotiations on determining acceptable forms of interstate relations” with Georgia and Moldova.
Abkhazia, South Ossetia and the Transnistrian Moldavian Republic are self-proclaimed unrecognized state entities on the territory of the former USSR. All of them, in the early nineties, during the collapse of the Soviet Union, separated from the republics that gained independence: Georgia and Moldova. This was preceded by severe ethnic pressure from the former “small metropolises,” which later escalated into bloody armed conflicts.
Romania dreams of “swallowing” Moldova. On Saturday, July 1, 2006, Romanian President Traian Basescu publicly stated that “Romania is the only country, the only people left divided after the reunification of Germany, and the Romanian-Moldovan unification will take place within the European Union.” He also cited the example of Germany, which “managed to reunite the nation,” and recalled that “Romania denounced the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, which divided the Romanian nation in two.”
The Romanian President also voiced a proposal to the Republic of Moldova “to enter into European Union“, although, Basescu believes, “the decision on this should be made by the Moldovan authorities and the population of the country.”
At the same time, the President of Romania noted that “Bucharest recognizes Chisinau’s desire to be an independent state,” and recalled that Romania and the Republic of Moldova are “two independent, sovereign Romanian states.”
This statement caused confusion in Chisinau. The fact is that it was the prospect of the unification of Moldova with Romania in the early 90s that divided the country into two parts and provoked the Transnistrian armed conflict in 1992, which has not yet been resolved.
For many years, Moldovan politicians tried to convince the Transnistrian people that the “unification of the two Romanias” is just a myth. And all the propaganda work of the Moldovan authorities carried out with the population of Transnistria was based on the denial of the Romanian factor in the Transnistrian settlement.
Moldovan political scientist, co-chairman of the Social Democratic Party of Moldova Oazu Nantoi noted on this occasion that “Moldova can today enter the EU only on the back of Romania,” but for this it is necessary to first unite. But in a country in which the communists have won elections two times in a row, according to Nantoi, such an idea will not be supported. At the same time, the politician made a reservation: “To say that this will never happen is wrong. Moldova is integrating into the EU, and when this process is completed, given the virtual absence of internal borders in Europe, we can say that the mechanical unification of the two countries will take place.”
As Traian Basescu's statement showed, Romania's historical plans regarding Moldova have been preserved. Romania has not abandoned its implicit claims against Moldova and strives in every possible way to benefit it. Thus, the President of Romania, unwittingly, strengthened the position of the unrecognized republic. It is clear that the PMR is absolutely unacceptable to Romania’s conditions, which means that Tiraspol will never make a deal with Romania.
Forces of war. It’s probably not worth saying that Chisinau has abandoned the forceful reintegration of the PMR. But how realistic is the military operation of the Moldovan army “to solve the problem” of the breakaway territory? It is known that the Romanian generals have long been ready to support Moldova’s intervention in the PMR, as was already the case in 1992. At a meeting between Romanian Defense Minister Theodore Anastasiu and the President of Moldova, held on June 21, 2005, the issues of supplying Romanian weapons and ammunition to Chisinau in 2005-2006 and providing military assistance to Moldova in the event of armed operations against the PMR were discussed. Let's consider the composition and weapons of the opposing sides.
Armed forces of Moldova. The number of aircraft is 6800 people. Military budget: 9 million dollars.
Army armament: 229 armored vehicles, 120 BMD-1 airborne combat vehicles, 226 artillery pieces, 24 Grad multiple launch rocket systems, a division of heavy mortars "Pion" (they can fire nuclear ammunition), an anti-tank regiment (54 Rapier guns) .
Aviation; about 30 Mi-8 helicopters (although most of them, if not all, have been laid up for a long time), 6 old Polish-made Vilga 35 aircraft (of which, after the disaster in May 2005, only one is used - mainly for personnel training and education).
Air defense systems: - anti-aircraft missile systems S-200, S-125, S-75, Igla MANPADS."
At the storage base near Chisinau there are also 220 armored personnel carriers and about 12 thousand small arms with the corresponding engineering kit and other weapons.
The armed forces can be strengthened. First of all, this is the 11,000-strong carabinieri corps (about 3.8 thousand people and 19 armored vehicles are stationed along the border with Transnistria). This is also the special forces of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (2500 people). There are also Border Troops (about 7 thousand people), some of which may also take part in a possible intervention.
Armed forces of the PMR. The number of aircraft is 7.5 thousand people. There are four motorized rifle brigades (deployed in Tiraspol, Tighina, Rybnitsa, Dubossary). In addition, there is a special forces detachment (according to other sources - four detachments), a tank battalion, an anti-aircraft artillery regiment and an anti-tank division, an air defense brigade, an engineer battalion, a communications battalion, logistics units, and a training center.
Armament: from 18 to 70 tanks (T-55, T-64 and T-72), 150 armored personnel carriers and infantry fighting vehicles, 122 artillery systems (including 18 Grad MLRS, 30 howitzers and guns, self-propelled artillery mounts, 66 mortars).
Anti-tank weapons. Grenade launchers RPG-7, RPG-18, RPG-22, RPG-26 and RPG-27, mounted anti-tank grenade launchers SPG-9; ATGM "Malyutka", "Bassoon", "Competition".
Air defense systems. SAM "Strela-10", ZSU "Shilka", MANPADS "Igla", "Strela-2M" and "Duga"
Aviation: 29 aircraft: 9 Mi-8, 6 Mi-24, 2 Mi-2 helicopters; the rest are An-2, An-26 and Yak-18 aircraft.
Ministry of Internal Affairs forces: special forces battalion "Dniester" ("black berets") and nine police departments of 500 people each. Ministry of State Security: Delta battalion (blue berets), seven battalions people's militia numbering 2 thousand people and seven detachments of the Black Sea Cossack Army (up to 1 thousand people).
The potential strength of the people's militia is approximately 10,000.
Military-industrial complex of the PMR. The Pribor plant (Bendery), produces mortars and multiple launch rocket systems BM-21 Grad; "Elektromash" and "Metalorukav" plants (PM, TT, PSM pistols, AK, AKM assault rifles, "Policeman" combat kit, SPG-9 anti-tank grenade launchers.
According to media reports, at Elektroapparatny and the Plant named after. Kirov has recently mastered the production of "Bee" and "Gnome" grenade launchers, "Katran" and "Vasilek" portable mortars, and "Duga" MANPADS. However, on the other hand, this was not confirmed by international observers allowed by the Transnistrian authorities to the relevant facilities.
As we can see, the forces of the opposing sides are approximately equal, but it should be taken into account that behind Chisinau is the aggressive Bucharest. This means that an armed conflict can be bloody, where the greatest losses will be suffered by the civilian population. Therefore, the task of the guarantor countries is to continue the negotiation process in order to exclude any attempts at armed intervention.
Referendum in Transnistria. On September 17, a referendum took place in Transnistria. 78.6% of registered voters turned out at 262 polling stations. On the question “Do you support the course towards independence of the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic and the subsequent free accession of Transnistria to the Russian Federation?” 97.1% of those who voted spoke positively. Only 3.4% of Pridnestrovians spoke in favor of unification with Moldova. 94.6% of voters are against this.
International organizations declared the referendum illegal. The Council of Europe, the European Union and the OSCE have announced that they do not recognize its results. The same position is taken by the Republic of Moldova, which is seeking to regain control over Transnistria, and its neighboring Ukraine.
Official Chisinau did not recognize the results of the referendum.
“We do not recognize the results of the referendum. Yesterday will not change anything. The so-called referendum is a Smirnov political farce,” Andrei Stratan, Minister of Foreign Affairs and European Integration of Moldova, told reporters. He also added that the Moldovan authorities stand for real democratization of the Transnistrian region, and his department will continue to “promote policies for the reintegration of the country.”
The Russian side believes that the results of the referendum will not have real legal consequences. Nevertheless, as the head of the Committee on CIS Affairs of the Federation Council Vadim Gustov said, “this is a signal for the international community that cannot be ignored.”
The OSCE refused to send a representative to the referendum in Chisinau. Russia, at least at the level of state media, shows full support for the course of the leadership of Transnistria. Another unrecognized republic, South Ossetia, has planned a referendum on independence from Georgia for November.
It can be argued that the referendum in Transnistria has legal and political significance, since it is taking place in a de facto existing, but self-proclaimed and unrecognized state, the population of which is trying to exercise the right to self-determination.
However, the question remains whether residents of Transnistria will be able to take advantage of this right from a legal point of view. For political significance referendum is very important The question arises to what extent its preparation and conduct comply with democratic principles.
So far, the only place where the results of the Transnistrian referendum have been recognized is another unrecognized republic of Abkhazia. Its president Sergei Bagapsh assured that “Abkhazia supports Transnistria’s desire for independence and its choice to join Russia.”
By and large, the referendum in Transnistria is not a request for recognition addressed to the world community. The latter doesn't care. It recognizes those and then who are necessary and beneficial to it. And, as the story of the fate of Yugoslavia, which was dismembered and practically erased from the map of Europe, showed, the world community is absolutely not interested in all those norms and laws in the name of which it acts. And, by and large, it does the right thing.
Today, law is nothing without force capable of enforcing compliance with law. Politics are ruled not by international laws and “universal human values”, but by real state and class interests. And he is right who, when a right that is beneficial to him lacks strength, throws his strength into supporting a right that is beneficial to him, even if this right is controversial, but indifferently averts his eyes when an indisputable but disadvantageous right is trampled upon.
There are people living in Transnistria who, almost all of them, do not want to live in the self-proclaimed Republic of Moldova. And they want to live either in the USSR, or in the Russian Federation as its remnant. Or, as a last resort, in your own republic. No normal person can clearly explain why those who want to live in Transnistrian Moldova, which has had state status for almost eighty years (and has not lost it during this period) do not have such a right, but those who want to live in “ The Republic of Moldova”, which declared its state status fifteen years ago - do they have such a right?
Where do we have the rights of an “established state”, and where are the rights of part of it to secede? After all, Transnistrian Moldova (the former Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic) does not even lay claim to the territory reunited with it in 1940 - and nobly recognizes its controversial right to independence.
Conclusion. The past years after the proclamation of the PMR have confirmed that it can easily live without Chisinau, and without Moscow, and without Kyiv. The same cannot be said about Moldova, which has no electricity, energy resources, and production is in decline. Therefore, the main thing for Moldova is to find a compromise solution so that there is no final break with the PMR.
Applying the principle of uti possidetis de facto in the case of Moldova at the time of its declaration of independence, it can be argued that its territory ends where it ceases to exercise effective control.
For Transnistria, the principle of “uti possidetis” - the principle of maintaining the existing state of affairs by the people and the government, as well as continuous territorial sovereignty from the moment of declaration of independence are the key elements confirming the state sovereignty of Transnistria. In territorial disputes between two states, the principle of uti possidetis (“own what you already own”) applies.
Transnistria now meets all the criteria used to determine statehood: permanent population, certain territory, government, the ability to enter into relations with other states and has the necessary attributes of statehood - controlled territory, parliament, president, government, independent judicial system, defense, budget and population exceeding the number of inhabitants of many UN member countries..
It can be stated that the viability of the PMR state has been established, as well as the legitimacy of the state formation process. Transnistria meets all the criteria of statehood in accordance with international law.
Transnistria is not even a certain province of Moldova. This is the basis of its current statehood. It was Transnistria that was the first to receive state self-determination in the form of autonomy within the USSR, and only then in 1940 it became the sovereign Moldavian SSR within its current borders. That is, we do not even have such a state of affairs when a province is separated from the metropolis, here the metropolis, which has lost power over the province, wants to regain its status.
And another important point. The current PMR is that part of the Moldavian SSR that did not and has not left the Soviet Union. When it is called a “self-proclaimed republic”, this is incorrect by definition, because it did not self-proclaim itself, did not re-establish itself, it did not come out of anything. All this was done by the so-called. “Republic of Moldova”: it self-proclaimed itself contrary to the Constitution of the Moldavian SSR. It was she who established some new, never-existing state entity. It was she who came out - contrary to both the Union and Republican Constitutions - from both the USSR and the MSSR. If she doesn’t like that the base of the Moldovan territories did not follow her, that’s her problem.
The Ukrainian authorities are carried away by “unfreezing the conflict” at the behest of the West, but legally the PMR is the same state as Moldova and is governed no worse than the Republic of Moldova, and has the right to life.
As we can see, the PMR’s right to self-determination is no less respected than the principle of the territorial integrity of Moldova, of which this unrecognized republic has never been a part historically.
“Unrecognized” state does not at all imply rejection of its policies expected and vice versa, “recognition” does not guarantee popular loyalty. A certain extremism of the PMR authorities, rightly criticized by the world community, nevertheless relies on the mass support of the citizens of these formally non-existent states. This factor should certainly be taken into account when putting forward peacekeeping initiatives aimed at resolving the dispute between the “virtual” PMR and the “legal” Moldova.
We can conclude that Moldova is still a conflict-dangerous region in the southwestern direction for Ukraine.
The tragedy of June 19, 1992 burned bridges to unite the territories and peoples of Moldova and Transnistria. These events, so recent, are naturally remembered by both parts of the split Moldavia. In Bendery there is a Museum of Tragedy, opened in 1997. The events of June - July 1992 united the people of Transnistria and gave them a new self-identification.
The blood shed in the conflict between the pro-Romanian population of Moldova and the population of Transnistria will complicate relations in this region for many years to come.
Reference. For 2014
Average salary in Moldova in 2014 4225 lei ($325) - 375 lei more than 2013.
According to the Pridnestrovian Republican Bank, salary levels in the Republic of Moldova and the PMR, reduced to the general equivalent of the Transnistrian ruble. a resident of Moldova earns on average 15.7% less than a resident of Transnistria
Level of pensions in Moldova and the PMR below the subsistence level, Pridnestrovian pensioners receive Russian humanitarian aid in the amount of 166.6 lei plus monthly payments from the PMR state budget in the amount of 111.11 lei as an increase in pension. Taking into account all the allowances, it turns out that their average pension reaches 1,445 lei, which is higher than the minimum subsistence level, equivalent to 1,033 lei.
Real estate: One square meter on the primary market of Tiraspol will cost buyers 352 euros, on the secondary market – 392 euros. The offer price in Chisinau reaches an average of 820 euros per 1 sq. m. meter on the secondary market, and in a new building – 733 euros.
Child benefits
In the Right Bank, the one-time benefit for the birth of the first child is 2,300 lei, and for each subsequent child - 2,600 lei. The minimum monthly child care benefit for insured and uninsured persons is calculated at 300 lei. The monthly benefit is paid until the child reaches three years of age if the recipient is insured, or until he reaches one and a half years for uninsured persons. For insured mothers, the amount can be significantly higher. They receive monthly benefits for raising a child until he reaches three years of age in the amount of 30% of the average monthly income for the last 6 calendar months preceding the month of birth of the child. Everything would not be so bad if in Moldova most of those working in private companies did not receive salaries in envelopes.
In Transnistria, the additional lump sum benefit for the birth (adoption) of the first child is 3,380 lei, for the second and subsequent ones – 4,046 lei. In the event of the birth of two or more children, benefits are assigned and paid for each in appropriate amounts.
The monthly allowance for child care until he reaches one and a half years old for 2012 is set at 1,027 lei. Mothers who did not work before pregnancy receive 327 lei per month.
Payment for apartments, services: In Moldova, the lion's share of the family budget is consumed by services. Prices for gas, electricity and even water have become an unbearable burden for ordinary citizens. Electricity prices have recently gone up. For consumers of Gaz Natural Fenosa, the cost of 1 kWh increased to 1.58 lei, for consumers of RED-Nord - to 1.71 lei and RED Nord-Vest - to 1.73 lei. And residents of Transnistria still pay for electricity only 57 bani per 1 kW/h.
Russian gas remains the most expensive for Moldovans. A cubic meter of blue fuel for consumers who consume less than 30 cubic meters per month costs 5.97 lei (excluding VAT 6%), for all other users - 6.22 lei.
At the same time, Pridnestrovians pay only 91 bans per cubic meter of gas.
Prices for centralized heating also vary significantly. To make the comparison clearer, we took Tiraspol and Chisinau. In Tiraspol, the cost of heating is calculated as follows: 3.5 lei is multiplied by the total area of the apartment, then the resulting figure is again multiplied by the number of people registered in the apartment.
In Chisinau, heating fees depend on how many gigacalories are spent on heating housing of the corresponding area. One gigacalorie costs 987 lei. According to estimates, on average, city residents paid 30 lei per square meter in the 2011-2012 heating season.
Now let’s compare how much money a Chisinau resident and a Tiraspol resident spent on heating. Let's say both live in two-room apartments with an area of 50 square meters. meters, in which two people are registered. Thus, a family from Chisinau paid 1,500 lei per month in the past heating season, and a family from Tiraspol – 350 lei. The difference is not just big, but colossal.
In Transnistria, women retire at the age of 55, men at 60; in the Republic of Moldova, the retirement age for women is 57 years, for men - 62 years.
Recently, a trend has emerged in Moldova in obtaining a second PMR citizenship.
Literature
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Additional sources
Ethnic and regional conflicts in Eurasia: in 3 books: Book 2. Russia, Ukraine, Belarus/General ed. A. Zverev, B. Coppieters, D. Trenin. – M.: Publishing house “Ves Mir”, – 1997. – 224 pp.
Ethnic and regional conflicts in Eurasia: in 3 books: Book 3. International experience resolution of ethnic conflicts/General ed. B. Coppieters, E. Remacle, A. Zverev. – M.: Publishing House “The Whole World”, – 1997. – 304 P.
Myalo K.G. Russia and the last wars of the twentieth century (1989-2000). M.: “Veche” - 346С.
Euro-Atlantic Joint Forum GrupB-219. “State sovereignty of Prednistrovskaia Moldavskaia Respublika (Prednistrovie) under international Law” -I nternational Council for Democratic Institutions and State Sovereignty (ICDISS): -2006. 32P.
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O. Manachinsky. A tricky world on the banks of the Dniester..// Ukraine and the world today. – 16-22 June 2000. - No. 37– P.7
Manachinsky A. Without Transnistria, Moldova is impossible. Or vice versa? Weekly "2000". March 16-22, 2001. - No. 11 (64) - P. 25, 28.
The collapse of the Soviet Union was accompanied by many armed conflicts. Only a few of them have been resolved to date. At the end of the 80s, the collapsing USSR was divided along the previous administrative boundaries. Nobody thought about the fact that in the Soviet state, peoples were mixed, and the borders between the republics were cut for reasons of ease of administration. The widespread surge of nationalist sentiment in the breakaway republics also added fuel to the fire. The first such conflict, which went through all stages from rallies to war, was Transnistria. Far from being the bloodiest in the history of the former USSR, it became a harbinger of future troubles, a lesson that no one wanted to learn.
After the Civil War, Bessarabia was occupied by Romania. The USSR retained the left bank of the Dniester. After the Great Patriotic War and permission territorial issues with Romania, this entire territory united for several decades as the Moldavian SSR. However, differences remained between the narrow strip of land along the Dniester and the rest of Moldavia. Russian-speaking, Slavic-inhabited and industrial Transnistria even then stood out from the general background of the republic, which was more oriented towards agriculture and spoke mainly Moldovan.
In the 80s, Moldova, like many other republics, experienced a rapid growth of nationalist sentiment. At the head of the process was the local intelligentsia, who called for consolidating the status of the Moldovan language in the republic, and activists simply chanted the simple “Russians for the Dniester, Jews for the Dniester!” It often came to the point of assault during rallies, and both Russian-speaking deputies of the Supreme Council of the Moldavian SSR and simply people who spoke Russian too loudly became victims.
The situation has become especially tense in Slavic Transnistria and Gagauzia (a region where a small Turkic-speaking people, the Gagauz, live compactly). In 1989, the Supreme Council of the Moldavian SSR began discussing a language law, which envisaged the approval of a single state language - Moldavian, with Latin script. Moreover, activists of the Popular Front of Moldova promoted the ideas of unionism - unification with Romania.
Transnistria initially reacted with mass strikes. The region provided almost half of the industrial output and 90% of the republic's electricity, so this seemed to be a serious lever for putting pressure on Chisinau.
On June 23, 1990, Moldova declared its sovereignty. That same year, after beatings and altercations, Russian-speaking deputies left the Supreme Council. The rhetoric of the parties became more and more harsh. Mircea Druc, a prominent local politician - soon to become Prime Minister of Moldova - quickly moved from dialogue to threats:
They remind me of the SLA in Algeria or the white minority in South Africa. Moldovans are ready to go to the last, but not to retreat. If they do not accept our explanations, then there will be Ulster or Karabakh.
In Transnistria, the first governing body of a still non-existent republic has already been formed - the United Council of Labor Collectives. Protesters gathered around the OSTK, and it soon became the basis for the government of the self-proclaimed republic. Just a few weeks after the declaration of independence of Moldova, Transnistria and Gagauzia declared their independence.
The capital of Transnistria became the city of Tiraspol, and the head was Igor Smirnov, director of the Tiraspol Electrotechnical Plant.
The first event of the beginning of the war was the campaign against Gagauzia. Volunteer units began to be formed in Moldova to fight the separatists, and Gagauzia became their baptism of fire. The republic did not yet have an army, there were problems with weapons, and the nationalists went to the rebellious province with sticks and rebar. The meeting with the local self-defense units ended in nothing: the parties menacingly waved their batons, but so far no one has managed to step over themselves and start killing their opponents. It was possible to agree with Gagauzia on the status of autonomy. In Transnistria, events developed according to a much worse scenario.
Militia units were created in cities and villages, but both sides still lacked weapons. The source of replenishment was the arsenals of the Soviet army. Another source of weapons was assistance from Romania, which transferred its own military property to the Moldovans.
The situation of the Pridnestrovians was more complicated. Units of the 14th Army on the left bank of the Dniester remained under Russian control, but the troops officially distanced themselves from participation in the conflict. Nevertheless, the Transnistrian militia gradually armed itself. Many officers sympathized with Transnistria and did not interfere with the removal of warehouses, and sometimes they themselves went over to the banner of the newborn republic. It was the retired officers of the Soviet army who eventually found themselves at the head of the Armed Forces of the Transnistrian Republic.
While this process was going on gradually, the first blood was shed.
The fatal incident happened in the town of Dubossary. A detachment of Moldavian police went there and tried to set up a checkpoint on the bridge over the river. A skirmish broke out with a crowd of unarmed local residents, during which the police lost their nerve and opened fire on the crowd. Three people died, and the war has only gained momentum since then.
A real front began to form around Dubossary. The river and the weakness of the troops being created prevented the parties from launching active operations, but by the spring of 1992, having waited for the final collapse of the USSR, politicians in Chisinau finally decided to crush the rebellious republic.
In March 1992, Moldova's OPON attacked a Russian military base in Cocieri, near Dubossary. The police seized weapons, and soon a real attack on Dubossary followed from two sides. These were already full-fledged battles with dozens of dead and wounded. The “Romanian” side (the Transnistrian Moldovans constantly called them Romanians) took part in the battle mainly from police forces and nationalists.
However, the Pridnestrovians were not left alone: volunteers from Russia and Ukraine began to arrive in the republic. Transnistria was the first post-Soviet conflict in which Russian Cossacks participated en masse. The paradox of the 90s: a large detachment of Ukrainian nationalists from UNA-UNSO* acted on the same side with them.
As soon as full-fledged hostilities began, the Transnistrian people began to seize former Soviet military units much more zealously than before. The Moldovans soon discovered that entire armored groups were operating against them. In the summer, the attack on Dubossary stalled.
Not far from Tiraspol, on the western bank of the Dniester, there was a large city by local standards, Bendery. In the spring of 1992, dual power reigned there, the Moldovan police and local police were working there.
In June 1992, there were slow negotiations for a ceasefire. However, in Chisinau they decided to carry out a major operation. The specific reason for it was the incident on June 19: a Pridnestrovian officer was restrained on the street by Moldovan police, militiamen rushed to fight off their comrade, and a shootout ensued.
And in the evening Moldovan forces with armored vehicles began to enter Bendery. The “Romanians” first blocked the bridge across the Dniester, and frenzied contact battles took place inside the city. Civilian population I have never found myself in such a situation, people rushed around the city, not understanding what to do. Because of the panic, hundreds of people died who simply found themselves between two fires. In addition, the training of the combatants was at a low level, so the soldiers fired into the white light.
At this time there was a desperate fight in the streets. Pridnestrovians tried to unblock the bridge riding on armored vehicles taken from the Russian military. Several attacks were unsuccessful, but in the end a group of Cossack volunteers leapt across the Dniester. Due to the fact that the bridge and the approaches to it were clogged with burning equipment, the Cossacks, hiding behind it, were able to cross at full speed and capture the Moldavian cannons, which were firing directly. Soon a precarious balance was established in Bendery, but the front line ran right through the streets and gardens, and the fighting continued with the same ferocity.
In Moscow, the attitude towards the conflict gradually changed.
On June 23, an officer calling himself Colonel Gusev arrived in Tiraspol. General Alexander Lebed was hiding under this simple disguise. He flew to Moldova with instructions from Moscow to stop the war and restore control of the 14th Army, which had already spontaneously begun to be drawn into the conflict on the side of Transnistria.
A few days later, Lebed led the army, and with him “vacation” officers began to arrive on the Dniester, who were ordered not to cause obstacles. With the arrival of Lebed, the 14th Army switched to open support for the Transnistrian militia. On June 26, a Russian air defense system shot down a Moldovan plane that was attacking Pridnestrovian positions. And on the night of July 3 - after another shelling of Dubossary - the artillery of the 14th Army launched a short but brutal fire raid on the reconnoitered positions of the Moldovan troops.
Since until now the Moldovans enjoyed an absolute advantage in heavy weapons, the losses - and most importantly, the moral effect of this blow - turned out to be simply monstrous. Lebed himself gave out interviews, generously throwing out promises, if something happened, to “have lunch in Chisinau and dinner in Bucharest” and “to find the fascists a proper place on the pillar.” Lebed's determination really made it possible to stop the war.
A peacekeeping contingent of Russian troops was introduced into Transnistria, and the republic remained in limbo - not recognized by anyone to this day.
The conflict in Transnistria had no real basis. Moldovans and Pridnestrovians did not have real antipathy towards each other then and do not have it now. There were no deep-seated contradictions between the republic on the Dniester and Moldova. In essence, the only reason why the war took place was the irresponsible populism of politicians who tried to play the national card with donkey stubbornness.
* The organization’s activities are prohibited in Russia by a decision of the Supreme Court.
The conflict between Transnistria and Moldova also began with a fierce struggle against the Russian language in the territory where the Russian-speaking population predominantly lives. On February 16, 1989, on behalf of the Union of Writers of Moldova, a bill “On the functioning of languages on the territory of the Moldavian SSR” was published. According to the project, parents were deprived of the right to choose the language of instruction for their children, and administrative and, in some cases, criminal liability was provided for the use of a language other than the state language in official communication. On March 30, 1989, the bill “On the State Language” was published, prepared by the working group of the Supreme Council of the MSSR, in which Moldavian was proclaimed the only state language.
This led to the emergence of a spontaneous social movement, who advocated the introduction of two state languages in Moldova - Moldavian and Russian. On August 2, on the day of the celebration of the 49th anniversary of the formation of the MSSR, a group of nationalists from the informal association “Vatra” gathered in Bendery’s Oktyabrsky Park. They staged an unauthorized procession through the streets of the city - waving Romanian flags and calling for “getting rid of the Russian occupiers.” On August 10, it became known that at the upcoming 13th session of the Supreme Council of the MSSR, it would not even be the bill of March 30 that would be discussed, but an even stricter version of it, which provided for the conduct of office work exclusively in the Moldovan language. This led to the appearance of their own spontaneous “Maidans” in the cities of the republic - open-ended rallies were held against the artificial Romanianization of society. The population of Transnistria was especially active, where 87% speak Russian and traditionally pin their hopes for the future on Russia. The split in society and hatred between nationalists and the rest of the population grew like a snowball, but was restrained by the still existing Soviet power. When the USSR collapsed, this energy immediately splashed out.
On the evening of March 1, 1992, a provocation occurred - Moldovan riot police dressed in civilian clothes staged a fight. Upon receiving a call, a group of Transnistrian policemen went to the scene and were ambushed. As a result of the attack, the chief Igor Sipchenko died from his wounds, another guardsman was wounded. In response to the shooting of the police, on March 2, Transnistrian guardsmen and Cossacks surrounded the building of the Dubossary police department, disarmed the police, loaded them onto a bus and sent them to the city council building. During the arrest of the police, machine gun fire was opened from the roof of the police station. The shooter fled and was subsequently never found. The detained policemen were sent to the Tiraspol detention center and then exchanged for guardsmen detained by Moldova. On the same day, a special forces detachment of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Moldova entered into battle with a regiment of the 14th Army located near Cociere. Cossacks and guards arrived to help the regiment. The Moldavian detachment blocked houses with the families of officers and soldiers of the 14th Army and began to threaten them, in fact taking them hostage. In order not to put the lives of their loved ones at risk, the army command decided not to resist and ordered the weapons to be given to the Moldovans. However, Cossacks and militias came to the aid of the army - the Moldovans retreated. Some captured opontsy subsequently joined the ranks of the Pridnestrovian guards.
This incident on March 2 caused the escalation of the conflict - Moldova began to prepare for a full-scale “pacification” military campaign. The concentration of Moldavian troops began around Dubossary and Grigoriopol. Since mid-March, artillery shelling of the left bank of the Dniester began. On April 1, Moldovan police, accompanied by two BTR-70 armored personnel carriers, entered Bendery and tried to disarm the Transnistrian guards. The guards resisted. A fight ensued. A bus carrying cotton mill workers was caught in the crossfire, one of the women was killed, and several other civilians were wounded. The nationalist rhetoric promoted by politicians has not left aside the patriots of neighboring countries who are indirectly involved in the conflict. Volunteers and mercenaries from Romania fought on the Moldovan side, and volunteers from Russia, Ukraine and other post-Soviet republics fought on the Transnistrian side.
Then a group of fighters from the Popular Front of Moldova and the Chisinau special police detachment (OPON) attacked a motorized rifle regiment of the Russian army located in the village of Cocieri near Dubossary. President of Transnistria Igor Smirnov declared a state of emergency. The peak of the confrontation in Dubossary occurred in the second half of May 1992. The Moldovans received 34 fighters, 8 helicopters, 54 armored personnel carriers, 54 ATGMs, 144 guns, 87 mortars, 27 grenade launchers, 50 machine guns from abandoned military warehouses. From May 17 to May 20, the reinforced group carried out more than ten unsuccessful attacks, and also subjected Dubossary to intense artillery and mortar fire.
60 people were killed in Transnistria, half of whom were civilians. On May 19, the military council of the 14th Army announced that 10 mines had fallen on the territory of the military camp and that if the shelling resumed, a retaliatory fire strike would be launched. On May 20, the Transnistrian militias received at their disposal Russian tanks T-64 and armored personnel carriers BTR-60PB. Chisinau accused Russia of violating neutrality. However, the military, explaining the situation, said this: a crowd of Pridnestrovians, mostly women, entered military unit and forced the command to give up the tanks. On May 21, the shooting stopped and the parties were able to carry away the corpses. Some of the bodies of the Transnistrian militias were deliberately mutilated. So, a corpse was discovered Grigory Batarchuk with his fingers and genitals cut off, his eyes gouged out and a metal comb driven into his head.
In the summer of 1992, the center of the confrontation moved from Dubossary to Bendery, located on the right bank of the Dniester, but populated mainly by ethnic Great Russians and Ukrainians. Of the regular troops, the 2nd Bendery battalion fought on the Transnistrian side, which was supported by Cossack units - a total of 1,200 people. The 1st, 3rd and 4th motorized infantry fought on the Moldovan side infantry battalions and an OPON brigade with a total number of about 5 thousand people, as well as aviation. However, the Moldavian forces were soon driven out of the city. On June 22, two Moldovan MiG-29s bombed the Bendery bridge. They made several passes at the target and dropped a total of 14 bombs. However, to the surprise of eyewitnesses, not a single bomb hit the bridge. They "accidentally" entered Parcani, destroying several residential buildings and killing their inhabitants. On June 23, the planes tried to bomb the oil terminal at Nizhny Khutor, but again the pilots missed, and one of them was shot down by air defense systems.
The armed phase of the Transnistrian conflict lasted until August 1, 1992. Armored vehicles and artillery were involved in the battles on both sides. In particular, on the Moldovan side these were armored personnel carriers, infantry fighting vehicles, BRDMs and MTLBs, as well as anti-aircraft guns, mortars of 82 mm and 120 mm caliber, anti-tank guns of 100 mm caliber, about 4 units of 9K114 Sturm ATGMs and one anti-hail installation of the Alazan MLRS. From the Transnistrian side, several dozen units of armored personnel carriers, infantry fighting vehicles, BRDMs and MTLBs were also involved. The number of Moldovan armored vehicles exceeded the number of Transnistrian ones, so the guards used in battle vehicles not intended for military operations. In particular, PTS with a reinforced front part of the hull, armored railway cars and steam locomotives, KamAZ and KrAZ trucks covered with armor sheets went into battle. For example, one BAT-M track-laying vehicle was turned into a real rocket launcher. Craftsmen tore away from attack helicopter a unit for launching rockets and installed it on the roof of the tracklayer. Such a rattling cart moved along the railways, disguised with spruce branches. And when “Grandfather Kuzmich” (the shooter’s call sign) hiding there discovered enemy units, he unexpectedly revealed his “surprise” and launched a formidable attack.
The hostilities were stopped thanks to Russian intervention. Troops under the command of General Alexander Lebed intervened in the conflict to protect civilians and stop the bloodshed. Currently, security in the conflict zone is ensured by the Joint Peacekeeping Forces of Russia, Moldova, the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic and military observers from Ukraine.
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