Residents of Moldova’s enclave of Transnistria are enduring an energy crisis that has shut down factories, left Soviet-era apartment blocks without heating and raised questions about its survival. The hydroelectric power plant in Dubasari, for which Russia has provided virtually free gas, in Transnistria, on Jan. 4, 2024.ANDREEA CAMPEANU/The New York Times News Service
The Prime Minister of Moldova has accused the Kremlin of manufacturing a humanitarian crisis in the breakaway region of Transnistria as part of an effort to further destabilize the strategically vital country.
Many of the 400,000 residents of the Moscow-backed region of Transnistria – which sits on the western border of Ukraine – have been without heating and electricity since Jan. 1, and the expiry of an agreement that saw Ukraine transport Russian natural gas to much of Eastern Europe via its network of pipelines.
The end of the five-year gas transit deal – which Kyiv honoured despite the full-scale invasion of Ukraine that Russia launched in February, 2022 – was long expected. Moscow could continue to supply the region with gas via other pipelines that run under the Black Sea and via Turkey, but is refusing to do so until the Moldovan government pays a US$709-million debt that the Kremlin says the tiny nation owes to Russia’s state-run Gazprom energy giant.
Moldovan Prime Minister Dorin Recean said on Monday that his government owed nothing to either Gazprom or the Kremlin, with Moldova having largely weaned itself off Russian gas following the invasion of Ukraine. He said the growing suffering of Transnistria residents was part of a Kremlin plot to turn Moldovans against their government ahead of parliamentary elections due to be held later this year.
“There is no point talking to Gazprom, because this is the deliberate decision of the Kremlin – to induce this humanitarian crisis,” Mr. Recean said in a Zoom call with international reporters.
“Russia is trying to again weaponize energy, this time in the region that it controls, in order to produce a security crisis here in Moldova, to change the government for a pro-Russian government that would allow for the consolidation of the military in the Transnistrian region and, correspondingly, exercise even more pressure on Ukraine.”
While Moldova’s pro-Western President, Maia Sandu, narrowly won re-election against a pro-Russian challenger in a November contest, opinion polls suggest her Party of Action and Solidarity will struggle to hold onto its majority in the country’s 101-seat parliament. Elections must be held by July at the latest.
There are 1,500 Russian soldiers stationed in Transnistria, which declared independence from Moldova following a brief war in 1992. While Moscow refers to the detachment as “peacekeepers,” the Moldovan government and its allies in the West see the region as being under de facto Russian occupation, amid lingering worries that it could be used to open a new front in the war for Ukraine.
Transnistria’s Kremlin-backed leader, Vadim Krasnoselsky, said Monday that the region was facing an unprecedented crisis that he blamed on the Moldovan government’s refusal to pay its debt. He said demand on Transnistria’s sole power station was one-third higher than its output. “If this situation continues, the station may go into emergency mode. There could be some kind of technological malfunction and even a fire,” Mr. Krasnoselsky said in videotaped remarks to other Transnistrian officials that were posted on social media. “Then we will be left without any electricity at all, then a very bad scenario will arrive.”
Mr. Krasnoselsky accused the Moldovan government of trying to “crush” Transnistria and called on residents to burn firewood for heat.
Mr. Recean said Moldova sought only the peaceful reunification of its territory. He called for Russia to withdraw its troops from Transnistria and allow the Moldovan government to administer services there. If the crisis escalated, he said, Transnistria residents could be expected to relocate to other parts of Moldova in order to receive basic services.
“These are not refugees. These are our citizens. These will be internally displaced people. If they cannot survive anymore on the left bank [of the Dniester River] without electricity, heating and water, then we will be hosting them here on the right bank,” he said.
Mr. Recean said his government was trying hard to convince Transnistria residents, as well as other Moldovans, that the swelling crisis had been intentionally caused by Moscow, rather than the government in Chisinau. “This is one of our greatest concerns.”