Sixteen years after the start of the war of independence and territorial integrity of the Republic of Moldova, the National Union of Independence War Veterans is organising commemorative events throughout the country to remember the heroes that were killed in combat, Info-Prim Neo reports. The events will start with liturgies officiated by the clergy of the Bessarabian Metropolitan Church and the Moldovan Metropolitan Church. At a news conference on Friday, February 29, the leader of the Union, Eduard Maican, has stated that the war veterans, the survivors, are duty-bound not to forget their fallen brothers in arms. This is exactly the reason why the veterans have repeatedly asked the government to designate March 2 as the Remembrance Day, like in other countries of the world. Traditionally, a Remembrance March will be held in Chisinau on March 2, which will start from the Great National Assembly Square and finish at the Eternity Memorial, which hosts the monument to the soldiers who died during the Independence War. Commemorative meals will be served in all city districts. A special dinner will be prepared for the war invalids, the widows and parents of the soldiers who were killed in battle. A monument to fallen heroes will be unveiled in Basarabeasca town on March 1, while on March 2 a ceremony to lay the foundation for a another monument will take place near Cocieri village. The veterans of the war on the Nistru call on the central and local authorities, the political parties and the civil society to take part in the events dedicated to the remembrance of the nation’s fallen heroes. “The heroes don’t belong to the veterans’ organisations or political parties. They are part of Moldova and its spiritual heritage”, declared Eduard Maican. Mihai Tomacinshi, the chairman of Chisinau’s branch of the Veterans Union, urged every citizen of Moldova to keep a moment of silence on March 2 and remember those who never returned from war. March 2 is a mourning day for us, says Galina Fulga, a war widow. “It has been 16 years since my husband left home and went to defend our country, but it feels like it happened yesterday… The wound is still bleeding and it will never heal”, says the widow. The veterans believe the authorities have delayed a solution to the conflict for too long, as the time passes in the separatism’s favour. A new generation is growing up in Transnistria and it regards Moldova as an enemy, which is mostly due to the informational filter set up on the Nistru. In the veteran’s view, the only way of settling the conflict is to institute a dialogue between the two sides of the river, and first of all, between the citizens. Army Reserve Brig. Gen. Anton Gamurar, commander of the elite special operations unit “Fulger” during the war, has stated that such issues like the language, the history and the politics were just pretexts used to start the war. The goal pursued was in fact the intention to appropriate the wealth inherited from the Soviet Union. “The present-day politicians are ashamed to speak about that because many of them share a part of the blame for the disappearance of that wealth,” said Anton Gamurar. According to official statistics, 287 military were killed during the war on the Nistru, and about 3,500 servicemen remained invalids.