All hose living in Moldova must know Romanian, ex-ambassador

“No matter what nationality they have – Russian, Bulgarian, Ukrainian or Gagauz – all the people living in Moldova must know the Romanian language,” writer and researcher Fiodor Angheli, Moldova’s Ambassador to Turkey in 1998-2001, has told Info-Prim Neo. He recently completed his new project – a textbook for studying Romanian intended for Gagauz students and a Romanian-Gagauz conversation guide. “These two publications have one direction. The textbook and the guide will be very useful to those who want to learn Gagauzian. The first lessons are rather easy, but the next ones become gradually more difficult. The guide is practical and easy to use. It is full of idioms,” said the author. Fiodor Angheli said the Gagauz students have been disfavored until now as they had to learn Romanian through the agency of Russian. “Gagauz is a Turkish language, while Romanian is a Romance language and it is absurd to study it through the agency of a Slavonic language,” he stated. Vladimir Nosov, dean of the Russian Philology Faculty of the State University of Moldova, who wrote the preface to Fiodor Angheli’s textbook, said this project is a unique one in our area. The author is proficient in Romanian and this enabled him to treat the studying of Romanian in schools for Gagauz students from an original perspective. The dean considers that these teaching aids are opportune as an acute necessity appeared to create conditions for the Gagauz students to study Romanian and Fiodor Angheli’s textbook and guide are a first step in this direction. The publications will be distributed to schools in the Autonomous Territorial Unit of Gagauzia free of charge. Fiodor Angheli invested his own money in publishing the first copies, but said that both Prime Minister Vlad Filat and Head of Parliament Marian Lupu promised they will donate money for covering the costs of editing and printing the works. Fiodor Angheli is also preparing an extensive Gagauz-Romanian dictionary with the help of which everyone will be able to learn the language of the majority in Moldova, as the author said.