A number of civil society organizations and independent experts, combatants, newspapermen and lawyers issued a public memorandum addressed to the Government. Signed as an online petition, the memorandum seeks measures of response to the actions of the Operational Group of Russian Troops that was illegally deployed on Moldova’s territory. The petition was signed by 300 private individuals and registered organizations, IPN reports, with reference to a press release of the Institute for Development and Social Initiatives “Viitorul”.
The signatories request the Government to adopt a reunification policy whose objectives would include the demilitarization of the Transnistrian region and complete and unconditional withdrawal of the Russian troops, which are conditions without which democratic reintegration cannot be achieved.
According to the signatories, the Operational Group of Russian Troops generates serious security threats, fueling the black arms and munitions market, creating fighting capabilities hostile to the Republic of Moldova and illegally enrolling local population in the Russian troops. “The approaches of civil society should be accelerated so that they lead to the revision of the legal status of each member of the Operational Group of Russian Troops, alongside the monitoring of each illegal action committed by persons with administrative posts in the separatist regime, many of whom hold Moldovan nationality as well,” said “Viitorul” director Igor Munteanu.
Expert in reunification policies at the Institute Rosian Vasiloi said the Operational Group of Russian Troops take an active part in the military exercises “Zapad” (East), which are actually held in the Transnistrian region too, with contingents deployed illegally on Moldova’s territory and with the Transnistrian military. These exercises expanded by 30% on 2016 and are much more complex and ambitious and pose real security threats to the national interest.
The signatories of the memorandum call on the Moldovan authorities to scrap the ceasefire agreement of 1992, which, in the opinion of the Russian side, enables to accept a legal status for these troops in Moldova. The pullout of the troops should be complete and effective, under international monitoring, and should be accompanied by the withdrawal of all types of arms that the 14th Army (now the Operational Group of Russian Troops) transmitted to the Transnistrian military.
