The president of the Republic of Moldova, Vladimir Voronin, highly appreciated the results of the recent meeting with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin. The head of state, quoted by the press service of the presidency, states that his visit to Moscow is an important step towards developing bilateral relations with the Russian Federation and a concrete step towards settling the Transnistrian conflict. At the same time the president declares that this meeting does not conceal any intentions of changing the strategic direction of European integration. The press release refers to the interview of Voronin offered to “Moldova 1” TV station, State Agency “Moldpres” and “other several media representatives”, without opening the doors to all the accredited journalists. When discussing with the journalists, the head of state emphasized the standpoint of the president Putin, who said that Russia sees Moldova as territorially integral, sovereign, independent and neutral. Russia is interested in developing relations based on strategic partnership, Voronin said. Referring to the Transnistrian conflict, the president mentioned that the clear standpoints expressed by both sides, constitute an important step towards peaceful solving of the Transnistrian dispute in the “5+2” negotiation format. The two presidents also agreed on resuming in short time the activity of the Moldovan-Russian intergovernmental commission which will examine closely the possibility of solving the problems occurred in the Moldovan-Russian relations. “Immediately after the meeting, I ordered urgently preparing the activity agenda of the commission, which must cover such issues as wine deliveries and humanitarian co-operation”, the president underlined. Voronin states that he opted in Moscow for concluding a long-term agreement on Russian natural gas deliveries in Moldova, the VAT issue being also tackled. Moldova is the only CIS member country which buys natural gas without reimbursing VAT, the sum of which amounts to USD 50 mln annually. Vladimir Voronin met with Vladimir Putin on August 8 after a pause of 3 years.