The EU candidate status and membership in the Commonwealth of Independent States do not exclude each other, said the executive director of the Institute for European Policies and Reforms (IPRE) Iulian Groza. According to him, the Republic of Moldova will maintain the status of CIS member as long as this is advantageous from strategic viewpoint. For his part, expert of the Institute for Development and Social Initiatives “Viitorul” Igor Munteanu said that after Russia’s military aggression against Ukraine, the Republic of Moldova should leave the CIS as this is an organization that lacks prestige, IPN reports.

According to the IPRE executive director, there is no need to withdraw from the CIS now that Moldova obtained the EU candidate status as the country should benefit from the advantages provided by the East and the West.

“Moldova can be a CIS member before and after the accession to the EU if this is advantageous. The CIS is not a community bloc. It is a regional organization and the two statuses do not exclude each other. As the Republic of Moldova’s membership in GUAM, the status of CIS member does not offer us any advantage owing to this war, but we have important ties with other states, which we can maintain. There is no opposition between the CIS and the EU and the attempts to induce the idea that the two exclude each other should be avoided. The Republic of Moldova will form part of the CIS as long as this is advantageous from strategic viewpoint,” Iulian Groza stated in the talk show “Résumé with Ileana Pîrgaru” on RliveTV channel

For his part, Igor Munteanu considers the CIS is an organization that tries to promote only Russia’s interests and that, by its inefficiency, is useless for Moldova.

“First of all, it is about prestige. The Baltic states renounced together the membership in the CIS as they realized that this status wasn’t prestigious. After this war, we should reconsider our affiliation to some of the organizations. There have always been forces in the Republic of Moldova that opposed our affiliation to the CIS owing to the inefficiency of this organization and also because the CIS is dominated by the interests of the Russian Federation and there is no equal treatment,” stated Igor Munteanu.

The Republic of Moldova became a CIS member in 1994. According to the Ministry of Finance, in 2022 Moldova paid membership dues to 69 international and regional organizations. For fulfilling the annual financial obligations of the Republic of Moldova, 6 million lei was allocated for international parliamentary organizations, 50.7 million lei for international institutions and 5.6 million lei for the CIS bodies.