Five or six rounds of 5+2 talks to take place this year

Ukraine, which holds the OSCE Chairmanship, plans to hold five or six rounds of 5+2 talks on the Transnistrian settlement process this year. Besides the rounds of talks, there will be organized a number of meetings of Prime Minister Vlad Filat and the Transnistrian leader Yevgeniy Shevchuk, and of Moldova’s chief negotiator Eugen Carpov and Transnistrian chief negotiator Nina Shtanski. The Special Representative of the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office for conflicts, Ambassador Andrii Deshchytsia spoke about this in a news conference at the end of his visit to Moldova, Info-Prim Neo reports. The ambassador had meetings with Moldovan officials and with representatives of the Transnistrian administration. He said that in the meetings he saw openness on the part of the sides and thus there are no impediments for them to meet soon at the first round of the 5+2 talks this year. As to the reports that the Transnistrian side imposes conditions for taking part in these talks, the ambassador said that he didn’t see something like this during his visit. Andrii Deshchytsia also said that besides the round of talks, the Ukrainian OSCE Chairmanship will ahold meetings of Vlad Filat and Yevgeniy Shevchuk, of Eugen Carpov and Nina Shtanski. Andrii Deshchytsia said that the sides almost finished discussions on a protocol on free movement of people, but there are a number of technical aspects concerning the registration of vehicles and the movement of Transnistrians who do not have Moldovan identification papers that are yet to be agreed. The discussions on the protocol will be completed in a week. The next round of 5+2 talks on the Transnistrian settlement process will take place on February 18 and 19 in Lviv, Ukraine.