Moldova can become part of EU without Transnistrian region

Moldova can achieve the European integration objectives even if it did not manage to reunify the country by resolving the Transnistrian dispute, Manfred Grund, who is a member of the Foreign Policy Commission of the German Bundestag and the head of the Germany-Moldova Forum in Berlin, said in a meeting of the Chisinau Press Club, Info-Prim Neo reports. The German official said that even if Moldova can become a member of the EU without reunifying the country, the authorities should however take all the necessary measures for the Transnistrian population to want to make a whole with the people living on the right bank of the Nistru and to understand what advantages they will enjoy if they form part of an EU member state. Manfred Grund stated the Transnistrian region is regarded by the European partners as a territory where Russia deployed military troops in order to hinder the neighbors from leaving its sphere of influence. If this hampers the settlement of the Transnistrian conflict, Moldova may be allowed to join the EU without this region. He also said that when the Berlin Wall fell, the first statement was that they are the people and they take decisions, while the second was that they are one people. Manfred Grund inquired if the Moldovans from the two sides of the Nistru River cannot make a similar statement. According to Grund, Chancellor Angela Merkel and the former President of Russia Dmitry Medvedev reached an agreement on the resolution of the Transnistrian dispute and the Germans really want to find viable solutions to bring the conflict to an end, but they are not sure that the new Russian President Vladimir Putin would want to follow the Russian-German memorandum.