When the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991, states were created according to the regional divisions of the USSR. However, Transnistria, which was annexed to Moldova by the Soviet administration after World War II, declared independence five days after the dissolution of the USSR.
Moldovans dreamed of the American way of life, while Transnistrians pursued Mikhail Gorbachev’s model: to build a nation that was both democratic and communist. Furious, the United States tried to destroy this country in 1992 by recruiting a Romanian army under the command of NATO special advisor Colonel Howard J. T. Steers [1]. Boris Yeltsin’s Russia abandoned it, but the Transnistrians defended themselves and won their freedom.
Today, social benefits and salaries of public sector employees are not paid by Chisinau (Moldova), which does not recognize the independence of the Dniester Moldovan Republic while still claiming that Transnistrians are its citizens.
While an agreement had been reached between Moldova and the unrecognized Moldovan Republic of the Dniester (Transnistria) for it to have access to both the European Union market and the global market, Chisinau issued new standards at the beginning of 2024. Transnistrian companies, which trade with 90 countries, must be registered in Moldova in order to transit their goods through it. However, they cannot do so because the Moldovan banks refuse it to them. Nor can they do so via Ukraine due to the war.
Throughout the month of January, demonstrations were held in Tiraspol to protest against this economic strangulation. Two-thirds of Transnistrians have triple Moldovan /Transnistrian/Russian citizenship. 1,500 to 2,000 Russian troops make up a permanent peace mission in the DMR.
On 21st February Transnistrian President Vadim Krasnosselski convened all deputies in an extraordinary Congress for the first time in 18 years. Ukraine, which had tried to assassinate the Transnistrian president last September, immediately sent its ambassador, Paun Rogovei, to ensure that the situation did not escalate. On February 27, the U.S. State Department dispatched Christopher W. Smith, an assistant to Undersecretary Victoria Nuland.
On February 28, the Congress of Deputies met and appealed to Russia for help, but did not ask for annexation to the Federation, even though its citizens had done so in 2006 in a referendum with 97% of the votes cast and its government had done so in 2014 when Crimea was annexed.
In 2019, the Rand Corporation, a think tank of the US military-industrial complex, had drafted a plan to weaken the Russian rival by forcing it to intervene in Ukraine, then in Transnistria [2]. The plan was introduced in the House of Representatives on September 5, 2019.
In January 2022, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell visited the Ukrainian-Transnistrian border to meet with the European Union Border Assistance Mission to Moldova and Ukraine (EUBAM). The objective was to plan for the current crisis [3].
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