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Transnistrian Conflict on May 31 – June 14, 2006

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The OSCE Chairman in Office visits Moldova, Ukraine

OSCE believes it is time to start serious discussions regarding the transformation of the current peacekeeping mission to Moldova, the OSCE Chairman in Office, Belgian Foreign Minister, Karel de Gucht, said during his visit to Moldova on 31 May — 1 June.

The transformation of the current peacekeeping operation into one with international mandate and recognition would enhance security both for Chisinau and for Tiraspol, De Gucht said.

At the same time, the OSCE will insist that Russian troops and weapons are withdrawn from the Republic of Moldova. The OSCE is ready to allocate 10 million euros to support the withdrawal process. “This amount will be enough to conclude the withdrawal process in three months. It is an absolutely feasible task,” De Gucht was quoted by Infotag as saying.

Earlier the Russian Foreign Minster, Serghei Lavrov, told the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe that Russia had fulfilled all its Istanbul commitments regarding Moldova and Georgia, and the troops still present in these countries are peacekeepers. The extra 500 — 600 Russian military located in Transnistria are there to guard the Russian weapons warehouses, which serve as a guarantee for Transnistria that “Moldova will not swallow the region as a unitary state”, Lavrov said.

During his stay in Moldova, Karel de Gucht had a series of meetings with Moldovan officials and representatives of the civil society. On 1 June he travelled to Tiraspol where he met with Transnistrian leader Igor Smirnov. In Tiraspol De Gucht called upon the Transnistrian leaders to take a constructive attitude and return unconditionally to the negotiations in the “5+2” format. At the same time, De Gucht reiterated the OSCE stand on the principles of settling the Transnistrian conflict i.e. through a peaceful solution of the conflict respecting the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the Republic of Moldova.

The OSCE high official showed happy with the activity of the EU Border Assistance Mission at the Moldovan-Ukrainian border and expressed support for the new customs regime introduced by Moldova and Ukraine on 3 March. “There is no way back to the old system. We cannot change the rules of international trade. I urge you to negotiate the terms of foreign economic activity of Transnistrian firms. I call upon the Moldovan authorities to show flexibility in this sense,” said De Gucht in Tiraspol, according to an OSCE communique.

After the meeting with Karel de Gucht, the Transnistrian leader Igor Smirnov held a press conference, which he told that Transnistria will return to the negotiations table only after Transnistria will be provided international guarantees for conducting foreign economic activity independently.

On 2 June the OSCE Chairman in Office travelled to Kiev where he met with Ukrainian President, Victor Yushcenko, whom he thanked for his interest and role played in the Transnistrian settlement efforts. “We have to continue applying the Yushcenko plan, adjusting it to all obstacles and delays, and we must ensure that the «5+2» process is back on track”, De Gucht said in Kiev.

Observers qualified the statements by the OSCE CiO as a change of rhetoric and discourse of this European organisation and yet another signal that the European Union understand ever more the urgency of finding a viable solution to the Transnistria conflict. At the same time, the issues raised by De Gucht during his visit did not touch upon the most important and problematic aspect of Transnistrian settlement — the future status of the region, while the practical application of the proposal to transform the peacekeeping operation into one under international mandate will be a real trying stone for an organisation that takes all decisions by consensus.

The Deputy Secretary of the Russian Security Council visits Chisinau

On 1 June, the deputy Secretary of the Russian Security Council, Iuri Zubakov, paid a several hours visit to Chisinau. According to a presidential press communique, President Vladimir Voronin had a meeting with Zubakov, during which the two discussed the “prospects and mechanisms of some qualitatively new approaches to the Moldovan-Russian relations. Special attention was paid to the Transnistrian problem”. No further details were published regarding the objectives and contents of the Russian official visit to Moldova.

According to observers, Zubakov’s visit only several hours before the arrival to Chisinau of the OSCE Chairman in Office is not a coincidence, its purpose being to test the ground regarding the position of the Moldovan leadership on the Transnistrian issue.

Zubakov’s visit seems to have been meant to test the degree to which the Moldovan leadership holds on to its position [after the introduction of the new Moldovan-Ukrainian customs regime on 3 March] and whether it is ready to compromise more that it used to, analyst Andrei Popov commented on Zubakov’s visit in an interview with Info Prim Neo. “The Moldovan authorities need to be prudent and realist, and understand that Russia is undergoing a radicalisation of its foreign policy discourse and that on the eve of presidential elections in 2008 one can hardly expect it to compromise on anything,” Popov stated.

In this context, we would like to mention the statements made recently by the Official Representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Mihail Kaminin, regarding the South Ossetia conflict. In a comment published on the website of the Russian Foreign Ministry on 1 June, Kaminin said that although Russia respects the principle of territorial integrity, in the case of Georgia this principle is “a desirable situation rather than an actual political-legal state of affairs”, whereas the position of the South Ossetians is based on a principle “as widely recognised by the international community, that of self determination”.

Titled by the Russian and international media as a “diplomatic sensation”, Kaminin’s statements were interpreted by many as an open and official recognition by Russia of the right of break away entities from the former USSR to self determination. According to the Russian publication “Kommersant”, if until recently Russia proffered to give tacit support to the unrecognised regimes in Georgia and Moldova, now Russia is officially taking their side. This change is attributed to the West’s insistence that Russia withdraws its armies from Moldova and Georgia, but also to the European integration course taken by the two countries.

“Against the two states immediately started the commercial and gas wars. To chill out the non-obedient neighbours, Russia decided to connect another important leverage — the conflict areas,” the Russian publication states.

According to analyst Andrei Popov, given that one can hardly expect Russia to change its position in the next 2–3 years, in the meantime the Moldovan Government cannot but promote the necessary internal reforms and continue its rapprochement with the European Union, thereby increasing the attractiveness of the right bank for the inhabitants of the left bank of Nistru River.

May 16–30, 2006 June 15–30, 2006