From Tokyo or Beijing, in the Middle East, in European countries and across the Atlantic Ocean, to Washington and Ottawa, the diplomacy of the Republic of Moldova is the team we rely on to promote the country’s interests, stated Nicu Popescu, Deputy Prime Minister/Minister of Foreign Affairs and European Integration, in a congratulatory message marking the Diplomat’s Day.
“We work 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days out of 365, to ensure the freedom of our country, the prosperity of our country, the peace of our country, to provide quality services for our citizens, our diaspora, our businesses, and to ensure a better future for our compatriots”, declared the deputy prime minister.
According to the top Moldovan diplomat, last year was a historic one, the year in which the Republic of Moldova obtained the status of a candidate country for EU accession. “We wanted this for a very long time and here we are, starting in 2022, entering a new stage of our history. Obviously, this implies that we still have a lot of work to do, but it is already a structured thing that we will do together with the EU”, says Nicu Popescu.
The deputy prime minister mentioned that last year the country managed to strengthen strategic partnerships with many states, as consolidating support for the Republic of Moldova is crucial. “On the line of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs alone, we managed to organize 87 meetings with counterparts from 44 countries of the world. We managed to ensure the entry into force of 56 treaties, 71 new treaties were signed at the state, government and international organizations level. We were special guests at the G7 summit and the NATO meeting,” said the foreign minister.
“It will continue to be very important for us to implement all the objectives in security and defense diplomacy. We pursue the objective of strengthening the security of our state. Obviously, we will continue solidarity diplomacy for Ukrainian refugees, we will continue active economic diplomacy to open new markets, to increase exports, to increase trade that will constitute a more stable and broader base for our economy,” Nicu Popescu said.
Anti-corruption diplomacy will also be continued. Equally important is cultural diplomacy, both to maintain contact with the diaspora and to further promote the country’s image abroad. “For the coming year we will have a lot of work, I mentioned the CPE summit, but the absolute priority is the accession to the EU. You all know that we are working together to respond to the prime minister’s instructions, as a result of which we will develop a plan to speed up our EU accession process. Unfortunately, we lost many years in the process of getting closer to the EU, and we must make up for that lost time, that insufficient political attention given to the EU accession process”, concluded Nicu Popescu.
