Transnistria energy storage plant

Should Transnistria buy electricity?

“The elites in Transnistria acknowledge already that we buy electricity from the region not because we have to but because the alternative is to throw the region into a humanitarian crisis,” Moldovan Energy Minister Victor Parlicov said in an interview. Still, officials are unequivocal: It’s time to end the multi-generational deadlock.

Should Moldova buy Transnistria's gas?

In recent years, Brussels has given Moldova tens of millions of euros to build infrastructure and cement its connection to European energy networks, offsetting the costs of buying supplies from elsewhere. That means Moldova doesn’t have to buy Transnistria’s gas anymore, which could spell trouble for the breakaway state.

Why does Moldova rely on high-voltage cables in Transnistria?

Moldova also relies on high-voltage cables running through Transnistria, giving the region — and its Russian partners — even more leverage. “The beauty of it for the Russians was that by buying electricity from the Transnistrian region, we were basically financing the separatism in our own country,” Parlicov said. The EU has changed that calculus.

Should Transnistria end its energy monopoly?

Undercutting the breakaway region’s cash flow by ending its energy monopoly offers a chance to heal the country’s divisions and join the bloc as one nation. “Solving the energy issue with Transnistria would be a major step forward,” said Viola von Cramon-Taubadel, a German MEP and member of the European Parliament’s foreign affairs committee.

Should Transnistria be stopped?

Stopping payments to Transnistria would collapse the separatist state’s budget and leave hundreds of thousands of people there without incomes and basic services — a challenge that, for a country Moldova’s size, would be akin to the reunification of Germany following the fall of the Berlin Wall.

How many Russian troops are in Transnistria?

Wearing camouflage uniforms, they huddle together against the rain at a checkpoint emblazoned with the Soviet hammer and sickle. These are just a few of the 1,500 Russian troops keeping Transnistria under Moscow’s thumb, more than 30 years after Moldova gained independence from the USSR.