Chisinau will ratify CFE Treaty only if Russia withdraws troops from Moldova
Only the complete, undisrupted and transparent withdrawal of the Russian troops and ammunition from the territory of Moldova will create prerequisites for initiating the procedures for ratifying the Adapted CFE Treaty, Moldova’s Vice-minister of Foreign Affairs Eugenia Kistruga stated on Wednesday, June 13, at the Extraordinary Conference of the States Parties to the CFE Treaty.
In her words, Moldova considers the CFE Treaty as a cornerstone of the European security and a fundamental guarantee of the national security, and supports the need to ratify the adapted treaty. At the same time, the authorities in Chisinau call on Russia again to fulfil the decisions taken by the OSCE Istanbul Summit in 1999.
In that context, the Moldovan delegation called attention of its partners to the lack of transparency in what concerns the military potential stationed in Moldova’s Transnistrian region. In addition, it was emphasised the need for changing the existent peace-keeping mechanism, which repeatedly proved its incapacity to control the situation and solve problems occurring in the Security Zone.
Moldova’s position was supported by the state parties to the CFE treaty, NATO nations, as well as by Georgia, Azerbaijan, and Ukraine.
The Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE Treaty), signed in 1990, by the 22 members of NATO and the former Warsaw Pact, is a landmark arms control agreement that established parity in major conventional forces between East and West. Following the demise of the Warsaw Pact and the enlargement of NATO in the 1990s, the CFE States Parties signed the Adaptation Agreement in 1999, to amend the CFE Treaty to take account of the evolving European geo-strategic environment. Ratification by NATO Allies of the Adapted Treaty is awaiting Russia's compliance with adapted CFE flank provisions and continued fulfillment of its Istanbul summit commitments regarding withdrawals of Russian forces from Georgia and Moldova.