Moldova: A divided country

I had first visited Moldova in July 2022, travelling down from Iaşi (pronounced Yash), in Romania, and spending a couple of days in Chişinău before heading to Odessa. That was my first visit to Ukraine since Russia’s full-scale invasion of the country that February. In the absence of direct flights to Ukraine due to the war, Moldova has become one of the main entry points into the country. Dozens of buses travel from Chişinău to Odessa every day, most people coming straight out of the airport and on to a bus. Refugees visiting their homes, women and children reuniting with their husbands and fathers who are not allowed to leave Ukraine.

I had not fully appreciated Chişinău on that first visit (see post of 23 July 2023). My perspective had been distorted by my arrival at the central bus station, situated in the heart of the city’s sprawling central market, a somewhat rundown neighbourhood, bustling during the daytime, but almost empty and rather forbidding in the evenings, when the market has packed up for the night. To get to my hotel, I had to pass along a derelict street of abandoned, broken buildings. I was in Moldova again for a couple of weeks in the autumn of 2024. On this occasion, I had the opportunity to visit other parts of the country, as well as Chişinău. I learned to appreciate Chişinău this time, its well-tended, shady parks, its cafes under the trees, its fine restaurants.

I was back again in the summer of 2025, passing through on my way down to Odessa, and spending a few days on my return. This time I spent a couple of days in breakaway Transnistria, the Administrative-Territorial Units of the Left Bank of the Dniester, as it is officially known in Moldova, or the Pridnestrovian (“by the Dniester”) Moldavian Republic, or just Pridnestrovie, as it is called by the unrecognised separatist state strung out along the Dniester river in eastern Moldova. In light of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, I had some qualms about visiting a territory under Russian control. On my visit to Moldova the previous autumn, I had been to the security zone along the ceasefire line separating Transnistria from government-controlled Moldova. On that occasion, I was on the side of the zone under Moldovan control, but getting there meant passing through a checkpoint manned by Russian soldiers, part of the trilateral peacekeeping force comprising soldiers from Moldova, Transnistria and Russia.

The House of Soviets, with Lenin bust, Tiraspol

The left, east bank of the Dniester split away from the rest of Moldova as the Soviet Union broke up at the beginning of the 1990s and Moldova moved towards independence. In a brief war that surged in 1992, with help from former Soviet, now Russian forces, the Transnistrian separatists prevailed, leading to a frozen conflict and the deployment of Russian “peacekeepers” who are still there today. The breakaway region has a complex ethnic makeup, with a plurality of Russians, as well as Ukrainians and Moldovans, and smaller numbers of other ethnic groups.

The territory of today’s Republic of Moldova had been part of the medieval Principality of Moldavia, with its capital in Iaşi, which by the 16^th century had become a vassal of the Ottoman Empire. However, in 1812, the eastern half of Moldavia, today’s Republic of Moldova plus territories to the north and south in present-day Ukraine, was annexed by the Russian Empire. The western half of historic Moldavia went on to unite with Wallachia to form the Romanian state in the mid-19^th century. When the Russian and Austro-Hungarian empires collapsed at the end of the First World War, Romania expanded into ethnically and linguistically Romanian lands. Eastern Moldova, also known as Bessarabia, was incorporated into Romania. But the east bank of the Dniester became part of Soviet Ukraine.

In 1924, the Soviets created the Moldavian Autonomous Socialist Republic along the east bank of the Dniester, within Soviet Ukraine. The capital was initially in Balta, which is today a district of Odessa Region, but in 1929 it was moved to Tiraspol. The idea for the Soviets was that this autonomous region would be a magnet for the rest of Moldova, which they hoped to recover. When, during the Second World War, Moldova was annexed by the Soviet Union, the east bank of the Dniester, including Tiraspol, became part of the Moldavian Soviet Republic.

As the fighting in Transnistria reached its culmination in the summer of 1992, separatist forces, aided by the Russian army, seized the town of Bender, also known as Tighina, on the west bank of the Dniester. There are also pockets of territory on the east bank that remain under Moldovan control. Since 1992, the conflict has remained essentially frozen, although in 1997 an agreement was signed by the two sides, normalising relations between the two territories.

I have visited several unrecognised separatist territories, including Abkhazia in Georgia, Nagorno-Karabakh, when it was still under Armenian control, the Luhansk People’s Republic in eastern Ukraine, and Northern Cyprus. None of them have established a normal modus vivendi to the extent that Moldova has done with Transnistria. People travel back and forth freely. Marshrutkas (minibuses) leave Chişinău for Tiraspol every 20 minutes. Vehicles with Transnistria license plates (which bear the Transnistria flag) can be seen in Moldovan-controlled territory, just as Moldovan-registered vehicles can be seen in Transnistria. Entering Transnistria when I visited, the formalities at the crossing point were quick and easy. On the government-controlled side, no checks at all. On the Transnistria side, a quick check of my passport, my details entered in their system, and I was asked the purpose of my visit. I was then given a slip of paper, which I had to produce, along with my passport, on my return.

Transnistria is famed for existing in a Soviet time warp, with its Soviet era monuments, statues of Lenin and other Soviet heroes. Tourists visit Tiraspol for a glimpse of the old Soviet Union. The Transnistria flag even retains the Soviet hammer and sickle emblem. I had supper at a restaurant called Snova v SSSR (Back to the USSR), a kind of Disney land of Soviet nostalgia. But if a desire to hang on to the certainties of the Soviet world, above all its Russian primacy, was behind Transnistria’s separatism, beyond the outward symbols, I don’t think Transnistria today is very Soviet. Much of the economy has been privatised since the 1990s. Tiraspol has excellent cafes serving cappuccinos and delicious pastries, as well as numerous restaurants serving pizzas, burgers and all the fare of the modern world. Its shops are well stocked with all manner of produce.

Wall of Memory, Tiraspol

As well as the Soviet-era monuments, there are also memorials associated with the war at the beginning of the 1990s, commemorating the soldiers who fell for Transnistria. The Memorial of Glory in Tiraspol honours the dead of the Second World War, the Afghan War, and the Transnistrian War. At its centre is the tomb of the unknown soldier and eternal flame. There is also a World II tank. More recently, the memorial was reconstructed, with a Wall of Memory listing those who died for Transnistria.

In Bender, close to the western end of the bridge across the Dniester, linking the town with Tiraspol, there is a collection of monuments. The Stele “City of Military Glory” was unveiled in 2015 to mark the 70^th anniversary of the end of World War II. The president of Transnistria had designated Bender a “City of Military Glory” in 2012. Nearby is the Memorial of Commemoration and Sorrow, dedicated to those who died in the Transnistria war. The monument is described as an open chapel and is topped by a cross. Next to it is a restored infantry fighting vehicle whose crew had died in the fighting in 1992, and also an eternal flame. There is also a monument to Alexander Lebed, the Russian general whose intervention on the side of the Transnistrian separatists was critical in inflicting defeat on the Moldovan forces. Lebed was quite the hero for Transnistria. There is also a rather less well cared for monument to him in a scrappy untended park near the railway station in Tiraspol. Lebed’s involvement in the Transnistria war made him highly popular in Russia, and some considered him a potential successor to President Boris Yeltsin. He was a pragmatic general, who, despite his support for Transnistria, apparently regarded its leaders with contempt as a gang of corrupt “hooligans.” He went on to play a key role in negotiating an end to the first Chechen war.

Memorial of Commemoration and Sorrow, Bender

Yet another nearby monument in Bender is the Monument of Russian Glory, an obelisk topped by an eagle, which was inaugurated in 1912 to mark the centenary of Imperial Russia’s victory over the Ottoman Empire, and the annexation of Bessarabia to the Russian Empire. It had originally stood inside Bender castle, on a hill overlooking the Dniester, which has recently been much restored. All these monuments to military victories, those of the more distant past as well as the more recent victory over Moldova, seem to suggest a state fixated on war. This mirrors the obsession with war promoted by the Putin regime in Russia. In Tiraspol there were posters commemorating the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany, although it was the end of July, and the anniversary had been nearly three months earlier. Looking at the memorials to those who died to separate Transnistria from Moldova highlights the difficulties that would have to be overcome if Transnistria is to be reintegrated with Moldova.

Transnistria has faced a severe economic crisis in 2025, since Russia’s gas supplies were cut off due to Ukraine’s ending of a transit agreement at the end of 2024. Transnistria had depended on Russia’s supply of essentially free gas, which powered its industries as well as providing heating and electricity for its inhabitants. That dependency also ensured that Transnistria remained tethered by a tight leash to Moscow. The result of the cut-off was factories halting operations and power cuts for Transnistria’s residents. The crisis is potentially existential for Transnistria, where the economy and the government’s finances had depended on the subsidised Russian gas. An offer of EU help was rejected, presumably under Russian pressure. A partial solution was found by which gas is supplied by a Hungarian company through Moldova, funded by a Russian loan. But the crisis has highlighted just how vulnerable Transnistria is given its dependence on a faraway patron. Moldova itself, with EU help, had already been diversifying its energy supply away from Russia since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and is hooked up to Romania’s electricity grid.

Transnistria finds itself ever more dependent on Moldova. Transnistrian enterprises have to be registered in Moldova in order to trade with Europe. Since 2022, the breakaway territory’s border with Ukraine has been closed. People and goods can get into or out of Transnistria only through Moldova. As it is recognised as part of Moldova, Transnistria has benefited from the Association Agreement Moldova signed with the EU in 2014, boosting trade with the EU, as well as ensuring that Transnistria’s exports have to comply with EU and Moldovan standards. This economic dependence gives Moldova leverage. Moldova’s approach towards Transnistria, with its openness to free movement of people and goods is probably wise, and stands in marked contrast to Ukraine’s approach to the separatist territories in Donbas from 2014 until the full-scale invasion in 2022. The prospect of an eventual peaceful reintegration of Transnistria into Moldova would surely be worth such patience.

In the centre of Tiraspol, tall flag poles fly the flags of Transnistria alongside those of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, two separatist territories in Georgia that are sustained by Russian support. There are also representative offices of the two breakaway states, both in the same building. When I walked past, a man was busy putting up a poster commemorating the war in 2008, when Russia invaded Georgia in support of its South Ossetian clients. Evidently there is a strong common sense of shared destiny among these separatist lands. But Transnistria’s position, cut off and lacking a common border with Russia, is more fragile those of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

Out of Transnistria’s population of 475,000, according to the 2015 census, some 300,000 are reckoned to have Moldovan citizenship. Many Transnistrians have multiple passports, with around 150,000 having Russian citizenship, and 100,000 having Ukrainian citizenship, as well as smaller numbers with Belarusian, Bulgarian or Israeli citizenship, and many with Romanian citizenship. Walking in the centre of Tiraspol, I saw an advertisement for legal services for people seeking Moldovan, Russian, Ukrainian or Romanian passports. The demand for alternative passports would seem to indicate a high degree of pragmatism among Transnistria’s residents.

While there is little sign at this point of a willingness on the part of Transnistria to reintegrate with Moldova, nevertheless a pragmatic willingness to rub along appears to underlie relations between Tiraspol and Chişinău. This is partly due to force of circumstances. Without Moldovan goodwill, Transnistria would be totally isolated. This pragmatism could be seen in the Moldovan referendum in October 2024, on placing the aspiration to join the EU in the country’s constitution. The referendum passed by a wafer-thin margin, indicating the extent to which Moldovans are divided over the questions of their relationships with Europe and with Russia. It passed at all only thanks to the votes of Moldovans living abroad, who voted overwhelmingly in favour of integration with the EU (more than 200 polling stations were opened abroad, only two of which were in Russia, much to Moscow’s annoyance). Moldovan citizens resident in Transnistria had the opportunity to vote in special polling stations in government-controlled territory, many of them inside the security zone. Official data show that over 15,000 of them did so, of whom 31 per cent voted yes to EU integration. Visiting some of the polling stations, I saw that, while the majority spoke with polling election officials in Russian, many spoke Romanian. Evidently, at least part of Transnistria’s population identifies with Moldova and with its European future.

Russian influence and interference in Moldova is intense. While the conflict over Transnistria remains frozen, Russia has continued to pursue a hybrid campaign in Moldova, seeking to influence its elections, supporting pro-Russian candidates in the hope of bringing to power a government more conducive to Russian interests. This was very much evident in the referendum and presidential election, the first round of which was held on the same day. The process was marred by massive vote-buying, involving money transfers from Russia, a key role being played by the pro-Russian Israeli-born Moldovan politician Ilan Shor, who currently resides in Russia, a fugitive from justice in Moldova following his conviction over a massive banking fraud.

Pro-Russian sentiment remains widespread in Moldova. A couple of weeks after the referendum, I was in the southern region of Gagauzia, an autonomous territory in southern Moldova. The Gagauz are a Turkic-speaking Orthodox Christian people, found in southern Bessarabia, in neighbouring Ukraine, as well as in Moldova. Most Gagauz had opposed Moldovan independence. Worried by the example set by violent separatism in Transnistria, in the 1990s Chişinău granted the Gagauz territorial autonomy within Moldova. Soviet nostalgia and pro-Russian sentiment remain potent within the region. In Gagauzia’s regional capital, I visited the local winery. It houses a museum of Soviet nostalgia, including artefacts from Soviet times, Soviet military and Komsomol (Communist youth league) hats that you can try on, a Lenin bust, and all the old flags of the Soviet republics, including the hammer and sickle. In referendums in Gagauzia in 2014, more than 98 per cent voted in favour of joining the Customs Union of Russia, Belaris and Kazakhstan. Over 97 per cent opposed integration with the EU, and nearly 99 per cent supported independence in case Moldova were to unite with Romania. In the October 2024 referendum, nearly 95 per cent in Gagauzia voted against EU integration.

Although the Gagauz have their own language, the lingua franca in Gagauzia is Russian, and during my stay in the regional capital, Comrat, and in my travels around the region, I mostly heard Russian spoken. Many Gagauz speak Romanian poorly, and there is a lot of sensitivity about the Romanian language being imposed. Within Gagauzia, people have the right to use Gagauz or Russian, as well as Romanian, in public life. I was told that many people do speak Gagauz in rural areas, but oddly, it seems that the language issue in Gagauzia is mainly about defending the use of Russian, rather than of Gagauz.

While the referendum in favour of EU integration marginally passed, thanks to the votes of the Moldovan diaspora, the majority of regions in the country voted against. As well as Gagauzia in the south, neighbouring Taraclia disrict, with its ethnic-Bulgarian majority, voted “no” by 92 per cent, and much of the north also voted strongly against. The presidential election held at the same pitted the pro-western incumbent, Maia Sandu, against Aleksandr Stoianoglo, an ethnic-Gagauz who was seen as the pro-Russian candidate. While Stoianoglo said he supported Moldova’s European path, he opposed the referendum question on enshrining EU integration in the constitution, and promised a foreign policy that balanced East and West. Sandu emerged victorious with 55 per cent of the vote. Mirroring the referendum result, support for Stoianoglo was stronger in the south and north.

While Sandu supporters put the closeness of the referendum and election results down to Russian interference and vote-buying, nevertheless the results would suggest Moldovan society remains divided over its relations with Russia and Europe. Rather than scorning those citizens who are unconvinced by the EU integration path, Ukraine’s example might serve as a salutary warning to proceed with caution, avoiding polarisation and seeking a broader consensus about the country’s European future. Moldova’s path towards Europe is surely clear. But with an aggressive Russian regime still using all means to put obstacles in its way, and a population much of which remains to be convinced, caution would surely be prudent.

War weariness in Ukraine

In the weeks before my arrival back in Ukraine in mid-July 2025, the country had been subjected to some of the most intense Russian missile and drone strikes since the onset of the full-scale invasion in 2022. Hundreds of drones in single nights, as well as ballistic missiles. Terrible pictures of red skies over Kyiv and other cities as fires blazed through the night, of shattered blocks of flats the following morning, and grim stories of families destroyed, of children killed. Travelling down from Chisinau to Odessa, I was expecting to find a country shaken by these terror attacks. I was expecting disturbed nights and sleep deprivation. Surely now people would be taking notice of the air raid alerts and seeking shelter in the basements? Yet when I arrived on a warm summer evening, my first impression was of normalcy. People sitting on café terraces, strolling in the neatly maintained city parks, children gambolling in the fountains, all apparently without a care. After a calm, restful night, I drank my morning coffee at one of the outdoor cafes at the city-centre Book Market. Men and women, young and old, relaxed, chatting, laughing. It hardly felt like a country at war at all.

But of course, everything was not normal. During my stay in Odessa, and again in Kyiv a few days later, there were night-time drone strikes. I slept right through them, my phone switched off so that I did not hear the air raid alert app, sheltered from the bangs by the double glazing and the ear muffles I wore. Buildings were hit, people were killed and injured. In Kyiv, a metro station not too far from my accommodation was hit. The station platforms, where people were sheltering from the drones, were engulfed in smoke. Yet on the following morning, people went about their business, drank their morning coffees, carried on as if nothing had happened. The afternoon after the strike on the metro station, workmen were busy about their repairs, replacing broken glass with plywood, and the station, despite some debris scattered about the entrance hall, was working normally.

Kyiv: the aftermath of a missile and drone attack

There is an outlandish dissonance between the reality of a desperate war for national survival, with thousands of soldiers risking their lives in the trenches among the shattered towns and villages along the frontline, the frequent missile and drone attacks on cities throughout the country, and the normal everyday life that continues amidst it all. While young men enjoy the good life in towns and cities like Odessa and Kyiv, going out to bars and cafes, frolicking with their girlfriends, other men, many of them by no means young, endure the destruction, the daily confrontation with death at the frontline, the terror of shellfire and drones, the loss of friends and comrades. And then there are the wounded, the men missing legs or arms that one passes in the streets of Kyiv and other cities. So many sacrifices. What must they think of these young men living it up at home as if everything were normal?

Ukraine’s armed forces face a severe shortfall of men. With certain exemptions, men aged between 25 and 60 are subject to the draft. Social media are full of stories of men being nabbed in the street and sent off to the army. Many live in fear of being caught. Some avoid going out more than is necessary. And despite Ukraine’s existential struggle, the wider society largely sympathises with the draft dodgers. There is deep resistance to the draft. Despite the advice of Western governments that the age for the draft should be dropped, there is strong opposition to requiring younger men, men in the prime of life, at the peak of their physical strength and fitness, to serve in the military. This year, there is a campaign to attract young men to join the army voluntarily, with higher wages than other soldiers receive. It is claimed to have had some success. But still, Ukraine’s need for more recruits is not being met.

What has happened? What became of the spirit of 2022, when, following Russia’s full-scale invasion, men and some women queued up to receive weapons and training, when men returned from abroad to defend their country? Is it exhaustion with the war? Is it that, after the disappointments of the failed Ukrainian offensive in 2023, and the slow, steady meat-grinder advance of the Russian invader, people have lost hope in eventual victory? Several people I spoke to gave their reasons. Relatives or friends who had served in the army had told them about chaos and mismanagement, of incompetent officers and of lives needlessly lost. Stories emerged from the front of new units decimated the first time they came into contact with the enemy, of new recruits fleeing in the face of Russian offensives, of desertions. No doubt, mistakes have been made. Chaos and confusion have always been a part of the horrible experience of war. Random, futile death has always been as much a part of warfare as heroic sacrifice.

The Ukrainian government’s reluctance to extend the draft to include younger men reflects the widely held position of Ukrainian society, the reluctance to make the sacrifices necessary to defeat Russia and expel the aggressor from Ukrainian land. Ukrainians are justifiably resentful about the slowness of Western allies to provide the weapons needed. Time and again, the West resisted sending crucial weapons systems, anti-aircraft missiles, artillery, tanks, aircraft, long-range missiles, and then relented too late, when opportunities had been missed, when the Russians had prepared fortifications, or moved logistics centres out of range. Western governments’ tardiness in sending weapons have cost Ukraine dearly.

But if Ukraine is to liberate Russian-occupied territory, whatever weapons systems it has, it would involve men going on the offensive against heavily fortified Russian positions, with the losses that would inevitably entail. Ukrainian military commanders have sometimes talked up the potential of new technologies that would enable them to take back territory while preserving the lives of their soldiers. Well, up to a point. But the Russians are also matching Ukrainian technological advances, and their leaders have no such qualms about sending young men to their deaths. Ukrainian society needs to decide whether it is ready to pay the price for liberating its land. And if not, perhaps it would be better to seek terms with Russia sooner rather than later.

One of my friends in Kyiv, originally from occupied Luhansk, told me he no longer thought Ukraine could take back the territory it had lost. Recent opinion surveys suggest his viewpoint is typical, that much higher numbers of Ukrainians are now willing to entertain the idea of giving up occupied land for peace. In 2022, he had been bullish, determined. Millions of Ukrainians were ready to fight for their country, he had said then. Now he was convinced most Ukrainians would accept the loss of territory, if it could bring an end to the war. This seems to be a widespread view now. That the sacrifices are too great. That, in the face of Russia’s greater size and capacity to wage war, and with the inadequate support of the country’s allies, it would be better to make peace sooner rather than later. And then there is the morale-shattering withdrawal of American support by the Trump administration, the shock of depending on a US president who cares not a jot for Ukraine or for the transatlantic alliance, and who places a far higher value on his relationship with the dictator Putin.

The idea that Ukraine should have to give up territory, that Russia’s aggression should be rewarded, is deeply offensive. Not just that. It undermines the basis of the post-1945 world order. If Russia is allowed to get away with its violent seizure of Ukrainian territory, every other would-be aggressor would be emboldened. And who would bet on Putin stopping there, once he had digested a chunk of Ukrainian land? But despite all the fine words, European countries have been slow to step up to the challenge posed by the noxious alliance of Putin’s aggression and Trump’s indifference. If we are not ready to give Ukraine the help it needs to defeat Russia, who are we to tell Ukrainians to carry on sacrificing their people indefinitely for what might, after all, turn out to be a forlorn cause? It is a terrible prospect. If things go in that direction, that Europe stands by and watches as Trump joins Putin in imposing an unjust settlement on Ukraine, it would rank alongside the betrayals of Munich and Yalta. But without adequate support from the West, Ukraine’s position would probably be impossible. The shame would be on the West, on Europe and America, not on Ukraine.