Two more parties back PLDM's appeal to OSCE Ministerial Council concerning presence of Russian army in Moldova

The European Action Movement (MAE) and the National-Liberal Party (PNL) back up the initiative of the Liberal-Democratic Party (PLDM) as to signing an appeal of the democratic parties to the reunion of the OSCE Ministerial Council in Helsinki to step up notifying the Russian decision-makers concerning their commitments made in in 1999 at the OSCE summit in Istanbul. The announcement has been made in a joint press release of the two parties, quoted by Info-Prim Neo. The Ministerial Council of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) is the main decision-making and governing body of the organization. The foreign minister of those 56 participating states will meet on December 4-5 this year in Finland's capital, Helsinki. MAE and PNL have repeatedly voiced to retreat, immediately and unconditionally, the Russian troops from Moldova's territory, “regardless of the their status – “limited military contingent” of “peace-keeping forces””. “Recently, our parties organized a joint picketing of the Russian Embassy, on the eve of the CIS summit in Chisinau,” the communique reads. Wednesday at a news conference in the quarters of Info-Prim Neo News Agency, PLDM's first deputy president Alexandru Tanase said “it is impossible to really discuss about settling the Transnistrian crisis, as long as this territory is controlled militarily by the Russian authorities.” “Realizing that Moldova's domestic political resources are limited, PLDM considers that only the more active involvement of the international bodies, of the European fora can impulse the Russian Federation to keep the commitments it made at the Istanbul summit,” lawyer Alexandru Tanase said. PLDM's president Vlad Filat told the same news conference that “the Russian military presence is the gravest problem Moldova copes with. It's the main obstacle on the path of reintegrating the country and of integrating Moldova into the European space.” “The events of the last summer in the Caucasus proved the Russian military, deployed to the conflict areas contrary to the will of those states, are rather carriers of instability,” the PLDM leaders say. In 1999, in Istanbul, Russia said it would withdraw the army from Moldova, but has never kept its word, invoking the interdiction of the Tiraspol authorities.