71% of Moldova’s population considers that Moldova should join the European Union and only 18.7% say that it should join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), shows the Public Opinion Barometer for October 2008, Info-Prim Neo reports. 41% of the respondents think that Romania can offer the greatest support to Moldova on the path to European integration, while 23.9% think this about Russia. 70% of those surveyed consider that the living conditions will improve after Moldova joins the EU. 50% of the respondents think that Russia should be Moldova’s key partner, 19.6% mentioned the EU, 19.1% - Romania and 2.4% - Ukraine. Every third respondent thinks that Georgia is to blame for the military conflict between Russia and Georgia, while each fifth respondent blames Russia. The correlated analysis shows that the population’s attitude is very much determined by the preferred sources of information, say the authors of the study. 30% of the population thinks that Russia could recognize Transnistria’s independence, while 29.2% consider it impossible. The survey was carried out between September 26 and October 20, 2008 and covered a sample of 1,100 persons older than 18 from 76 settlements, except the Transnistrian region. The margin of error is ±3%. The research was organized by the Public Policy Institute with assistance from Soros Moldova Foundation. It was conducted by the Center of Sociological, Politological and Psychological Investigations and Analysis (Civis) and verified by the research institute Magenta Consulting.