Moldova Persuades Breakaway Transdniestr to Allow Fact-Finding Mission In
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Saturday, 29 October 2005
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MOSNEWS - Russia
Moldova and its rebel Transdniestr region have agreed at resumed talks to send a fact-finding mission to the breakaway area to examine the prospects for a free election, Reuters reported.
Moldova and Transdniestr, run by hardline Slav separatists for 15 years, reached the deal at two days of talks. All meetings had been halted for more than a year.
Ukraine, Moldovas eastern neighbor, has promoted a peace plan based on holding a free, fair election.
But the Russian-speaking, self-styled Transdniestr republic, which enjoys no international recognition, plans a parliamentary poll of its own in December almost certain to be shunned by the international community.
The head of the Moldovan mission of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the main mediator, welcomed the resumed talks, while admitting results were limited.
We agreed on sending an assessment team to prepare for free elections on the left bank of the Dniestr,? William Hill told a news conference in Tiraspol, Transdniestrs capital?.
Despite the modest outcome of these talks, the very fact that they were revived after a 15-month break is positive.?
The talks featured for the first time participants from the U.S. and European Union, joining longstanding negotiators from Ukraine, Russia and the OSCE.
We have been very supportive of the Ukrainian plan,? said Steven Mann, a senior adviser for Eurasia at the U.S. State Department.
Adriaan Jacobovits de Szeged, special EU representative to Moldova, said a fair election was essential? for Transdniestr a sliver of land hugging the River Dniestr.
The OSCE had been calling for the dispatch of an assessment team. But it also acknowledged that it would take a long time to ensure conditions for a proper election in the region, which
Moldova and Ukraine accuse of engaging in widespread smuggling.
Separatists declared independence in Transdniestr in 1990 when Moldova was still a Soviet republic on grounds that Moldovas Romanian-speaking majority might one day merge with Romania.
The two sides fought a brief war in 1992 after the collapse of communism separated by Russian troops who remain there guarding military stockpiles despite Kremlin pledges to leave.
Moldovan President Vladimir Voronin, the only Communist party leader of an ex-Soviet state, says Russia is impeding a solution.
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