Everything about Moldova totally explained
Moldova, or, in full, the
Republic of Moldova (rarely,
Moldavia;
Moldovan:
Moldova,
Republica Moldova) is a
landlocked country in
Eastern Europe, located between
Romania to the west and
Ukraine to the north, east and south. The country is a
parliamentary democracy with a
president as its
head of state and a
prime minister as its
head of government. The official state language is
Moldovan, identical in its literary form to
Romanian. Like in all
CIS states,
Russian is also widely spoken and is the native language for 11% of the population. The capital and largest city of Moldova is
Chişinău.
In the Middle Ages, most of the present territory of Moldova was part of the
Principality of Moldavia, and was annexed from the latter, then a vassal of the
Ottoman Empire, by the
Russian Empire in
1812, under the name of
Bessarabia. Upon the dissolution of the Russian Empire in
1917-
1918, Bessarabia joined
Romania. In 1940, Bessarabia
was occupied by the
Soviet Union, and after changing hands in 1941 and 1944 during
World War II, it was split between the
Ukrainian SSR and the newly-created
Moldavian SSR. Moldova declared its independence from the
USSR on
August 27,
1991. Despite signing international obligations to withdraw
Russian military forces have remained on Moldovan territory; since 1993 they've been stationed in the breakaway republic of
Transnistria.
Moldova is a member state of the
United Nations,
WTO,
OSCE,
GUAM,
CIS,
BSEC and other
international organizations. Moldova has officially been a
neutral country since its independence, and an early member of the
NATO Partnership for Peace. Moldova currently aspires to join the
European Union and is implementing its first three-year Action Plan within the framework of the
European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) of the EU.
History
Moldova's territory was inhabited in ancient times by
Dacians. Due to its strategic location on a route between
Asia and
Europe, Moldova faced several invasions, including those by the
Huns,
Kievan Rus' and the
Mongols. During the
Middle Ages, the territory of Republic of Moldova, that of the
Chernivtsi oblast and
Budjak of Ukraine, as well as that of the eastern 8 of the 41 counties of Romania comprised the
Principality of
Moldavia (which, like the present-day republic, was known in Romanian as
Moldova). The principality became a
tributary to the
Ottoman Empire during the 16th century. In
1775 the northwestern part of Moldavia was annexed by the
Habsburg Empire, and called
Bukovina.
In 1812, according to the
Treaty of Bucharest between the Ottoman and the
Russian Empires, the latter annexed the eastern half of the territory of the Principality of Moldavia, including
Khotyn and old Bessarabia (modern
Budjak). At first, the Russians used the name "
Oblast' of Moldavia and Bessarabia", allowing a large degree of autonomy, but later (in 1828) suspended the self-administration and called it
Guberniya of
Bessarabia, or simply Bessarabia. The western part of Moldavia remained an autonomous principality, and in 1859, united with
Wallachia to form the
Kingdom of Romania. In 1856, the Treaty of Paris saw two out of nine counties of Bessarabia,
Cahul and
Ismail, returned to Moldavia, but in 1878, the Treaty of Berlin saw the Kingdom of Romania returning them to the Russian Empire.
Upon annexation, after the expulsion of the large Tatar population of Budjak, the
Moldovan/
Romanian population of Bessarabia was predominant. The
colonization of the region in the 19th century lead to an increase in the
Russian,
Ukrainian,
Lipovan, and
Cossack populations in the region; this together with a large influx of
Bulgarian immigrants, saw an increase of the
Slavic population to more than a fifth of the total population by 1920. With the settling of other nationals such as
Gagauz,
Jews, and
Germans, the proportion of the Moldovan population decreased from around 80% to 52% by some sources or to 70% by others during the course of the century. The Tsarist policy in Bessarabia was in part aimed at
denationalization of the Romanian element by forbidding after the 1860s
education and
mass in Romanian. However, the effect was an extremely low literacy rate (in 1897 approx. 18% for males, approx. 4% for females) rather than a denationalization.
World War I brought in a rise in political and cultural (national) awareness of the locals, as 300,000 Bessarabians were drafted into the Russian Army formed in 1917, within bigger units several "Moldavian Soldiers' Committees" were formed. Following the
Russian Revolution of 1917, a Bessarabian parliament,
Sfatul Ţării (October-November 1917), which was opened on, proclaimed the
Moldavian Democratic Republic within a federal Russian state, and formed its
government . Bessarabia proclaimed
independence from
Russia, and, under pressure from the Romanian army that entered the region in early January, on, Sfatul Ţării decided with 86 votes for, 3 against and 36 abstaining, on union with the
Kingdom of Romania, conditional upon the fulfillment of the agrarian reform, local autonomy, and respect for universal human rights. The conditions were dropped after
Bukovina and
Transylvania also joined the Kingdom of Romania. The union was recognized in the
Treaty of Paris (1920), which, however, has never came into force since it wasn't ratified by
Japan. The newly-communist
Russia didn't recognize the Romanian rule over Bessarabia. A mutual treaty between the Soviets and Romania wasn't signed due to the former's claims over Bessarabia. In the
Kellogg-Briand Treaty of
1928 and the
Treaty of London of July
1933, the
Soviet Union and
Romania have subscribed to the principle of non-violent resolution of territorial disputes.
Transnistria, at the time part of the
Ukrainian SSR, itself part of the
USSR, was formed into the
Moldavian ASSR (1924-1940) after the failure of the
Tatarbunary Uprising.
The
agrarian (land) reform, settled by
Sfatul Ţării in 1918-
1919, resulted in a rise of a
middle class, as the
rural population of the region represented 80%. Together with peace and favorable economic circumstances, it produced a small economic boom. However, urban development and the industry were insignifiant, the region remaining an agrarian rural region throughout the interwar period. The literacy rate grew from 10.5% to 37% by
1930; however the region still remained lagging in the aspect of
education, compared to a 60% literacy rate country average.
In an attempt to separate the Bessarabian
ethnic minorities from the Russian influence, the Romanian authorities allowed education in any language desired; with time, while
Romanian replaced
Russian in cities, the authorities sought to reduce the number of people in minority-language education and educate them in Romanian instead.
Soviet era
As a result of
Ribbentrop-Molotov pact (Article 4 of the secret Annex to the Treaty),
Bessarabia was annexed by the
USSR, as part of the sphere of influence agreed with Nazi Germany. On
June 26 1940,
Romania received an
ultimatum from the
Soviet Union, demanding the evacuation of the Romanian military and administration from Bessarabia and from the northern part of
Bukovina, with an implied threat of
invasion in the event of noncompliance. Under pressure from
Moscow and
Berlin, the Romanian administration and the army were forced to retreat from
Bessarabia as well from
Northern Bukovina to avoid war. On
June 28,
1940, these territories were
occupied by the Soviet Union. During the retreat, the Romanian Army was attacked by the Soviet Army, which entered Bessarabia before the Romanian administration finished retreating. Some 42,876 Romanian soldiers and officers were unaccounted for after the retreat. The northern and southern parts, which had sizable non-Moldovan communities (of
Ukrainians,
Bessarabian Bulgars,
Bessarabian Germans and
Lipovans), were transferred to the
Ukrainian SSR as the
Chernivtsi and
Izmail Oblasts. At the same time, the
Moldavian ASSR, where Moldovans were a
plurality, was disbanded, and up to 1/2 of its territory was joined with the remaining territory of Bessarabia to form the
Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic, contiguous with present-day Moldova.
By participating in the
1941 Axis invasion of of the Soviet Union, Romania seized the territory of the MSSR, and reestablished its administration there. Later, the Soviet Army reconquered and re-annexed the area in February-August
1944. In the region known as
Transnistria, Romanian forces, working with the Germans, deported or exterminated 300,000 Jews, including 147,000 from Bessarabia and Bukovina.
Under early Soviet rule, deportations of locals to the northern
Urals,
Siberia, and
Kazakhstan occurred regularly throughout the
Stalinist period, with the largest ones on 12-13 June
1941, and 5-6 July 1949, accounting for 19,000 and 35,000 deportees respectively. According to Russian historians, in 1940-1941, ca. 90,000 inhabitants of the annexed territories were subject to political persecutions. In 1946, a severe drought, exaggerated delivery quota obligations the Soviet state imposed on farmers, the forced agricultural requisitions employed by the Soviets because most farmers couldn't meet these, and the absence of a large part of the male work force (most of the Bessarabians enrolled in 1944 into the Soviet Army were not discharged until late 1946) resulted in a
famine (1946-1947), which resulted in 216,000 deaths and about 350,000 cases of
dystrophy in
MSSR alone. Similar events occurred in 1930s in Transnistria. In 1944-53, there were many
anti-Communist armed resistance groups active in Moldova; however the
NKVD/
MGB managed to uproot most of them with arrests and deportation.
After World War II, ethnic
Russians and
Ukrainians (commonly known as
Russophones) immigrated into the new Soviet republic, especially into urbanized areas.
The Soviet government began a campaign to promote a Moldovan ethnic identity, different from that of the Romanians, based on a theory developed during the existence of the Moldovan ASSR. Official Soviet policy asserted that the language spoken by Moldovans was distinct from the
Romanian language (see
History of the Moldovan language). The
Moldovan was written in the
Cyrillic alphabet, in contrast with Romanian, which was written in the
Latin alphabet (the language had used a different variant of the Cyrillic alphabet before 1860); to distinguish the two, when there's a chance of confusion, Moldovans commonly refer to the former as "the
Russian alphabet". Moldovan Cyrillic incorporated slight changes to the
Cyrillic alphabet, most notably the use of the letter
zhe with a
breve (Ӂ - ӂ) to indicate the sound /dʒ/.
In 1970s and 1980s, the Moldavian SSR received substantial allocations from the budget of the USSR to develop industrial and scientific facilities as well as housing. In 1971, the
Council of Ministers of the USSR adopted a decision "About the measures for further development of the city of
Kishinev", that alloted more than one billion
Soviet rubles from the USSR budget; subsequent decisions also directed substantial funding and brought qualified specialists from other parts of the USSR to develop Moldova's industry. This influx of investments was stopped in 1991 with the dissolution of the Soviet Union, when Moldova became independent.
Independent Moldova
Along with the other peripheral Soviet republics, Moldova started to move towards independence from
1988 onwards; on
August 31,
1989 a language law was passed, adopting the Latin alphabet for Moldovan and declaring it the state language of the MSSR. The first free elections for the local parliament were held in February and March 1990.
After the
attempted Moscow Putsch, Moldova declared its independence on
August 27,
1991, and in December of that year signed to be a member of the post-Soviet
Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) along with most of the former Soviet republics. Declaring itself a neutral state, it didn't join the military branch of the CIS. At the end of that year, a former communist reformer,
Mircea Snegur, won an unchallenged election for the presidency. Three months later, the country achieved formal recognition as an independent state at the
United Nations.
The part of Moldova east of the
Dniester river,
Transnistria, which included a larger proportion of ethnic Russians and Ukrainians, claimed independence in 1990, fearing the rise of nationalism in Moldova and the country's expected reunification with
Romania upon secession from the USSR. This caused a brief
military conflict between Moldova and forces supporting the secession of Transnistria in 1992. Russian military stationed in the region (14th Army) intervened on the Transnistrian side; it also remained on Moldovan territory east of the Dniester after the end of the military conflict, despite signing international obligations to withdraw, and against the will of Moldovan government. They still remain stationed in Transnistria. Negotiations between the Transnistrian and Moldovan leaders have been going on under the mediation of the
OSCE, Russia, and Ukraine; lately observers from the
European Union and the
USA have become involved.
The March 1994
referendum for a new constitution that stated the independence of the republic saw an overwhelming majority of voters in support.
Since 2001, the country is a member of the
WTO.
Post independence politics
During the first 10 years of independence, Moldova was governed by coalitions of different parties, led mostly by former communist officials. The
1998 economic crisis in Russia, Moldova's main economic partner at the time, produced a political and economic crisis in the country. The political flux was cleared in 2001 when elections saw the
Party of Communists of Moldova win the majority of seats in the Parliament. Its leader
Vladimir Voronin was appointed president. In economic terms, the crisis provoked an emigration of labor, as well as permanent emigration from Moldova. According to the census data, from 1989 to 2004, Moldova has lost about 400,000 inhabitants, or 9% of the population. Analysts estimate that actual emigration could be higher, as many seasonal workers remain registered as living in the country. Over 100,000 people from other former Soviet states have migrated to Moldova in the 10 years after its independence. Ethnically, the dominant group (Moldavians/Romanians) has somewhat strengthened its position, representing 79% outside Transnistria, or 71.5% including Transnistria. In absolute numbers, the Moldovan-Romanian population declined by about 50,000 people compared to 1989, while for Ukrainians and Russians this figure has reached 200,000 of each nationality; most of this change is believed to have occurred between 1998 and 2004.
Relationships between Moldova and
Russia deteriorated in November 2003 over a
Russian proposal for the solution of the Transnistrian conflict, which Moldovan authorities refused to accept. In the following election, held in 2005, the Communist party made a formal 180 degree turn and was re-elected on a pro-Western platform, with Voronin being re-elected to a second term as a president. Since 1999, Moldova has constantly affirmed its desire to join the
European Union, and implement its first three-year Action Plan within the framework of the
European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) of the EU.
Government
Moldova is a
unitary parliamentary representative democratic republic. The
Constitution of Moldova, adopted in 1994 sets the framework for the government of the country. In order to amend the constitution, a parliamentary majority of at least two thirds is required. Furthermore, the constitution can't be revised in time of war or national emergency, and no revision can be made that limits the fundamental rights enumerated in the Constitution. Furthermore, amendments to the Constitution affecting the state's sovereignty, independence, or unity can only be made after a majority of voters support the proposal in a referendum.
The country's central legislative body is the
unicameral Moldovan
parliament, which has 101 seats, and whose members are elected by popular vote every four years. The
head of state is the
president, who is elected by Parliament, requiring the support of three fifths of the deputies (at least 61 votes). The president appoints a
prime minister who functions as the
head of government and who in turn assembles a
cabinet, both subject to parliamentary approval. The Constitution also establishes an
independent Constitutional Court, which has the power of
judicial review over all acts of parliaments, Presidential decrees, and international treaties. Members of this Court is composed of six judges, two appointed by the President, Parliament, and the High Magistrates Council each. The judges serve for a term of six years, during which time they're not subordinate to any other power and can't be removed from their posts.
Foreign relations
After achieving independence from the
Soviet Union, Moldova established relations with other European countries. A course for
European Union integration and neutrality define the country's foreign policy guidelines. In 1995 the country became the first post-Soviet state admitted to the
Council of Europe. In addition to its participation in
NATO's Partnership for Peace program, Moldova is also a member state of the
United Nations, the OSCE, the North Atlantic Cooperation Council, the
World Trade Organization, the
International Monetary Fund, the
World Bank, the
Francophonie and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. In 2005 Moldova and EU established an action plan that sought to improve the collaboration between the two neighboring structures. The Vice President of the Moldovan Parliament
Iurie Roşca signed in June 2007 a bilateral agreement with the International Parliament for Safety and Peace, an intergovernmental organization for the promotion of world peace, based in Italy. After the
War of Transnistria, Moldova had sought a peaceful resolution to the conflict in the
Transnistria region by working with
Romania,
Ukraine, and
Russia, calling for international mediation, and cooperating with the OSCE and UN fact-finding and observer missions. On
October 1st,
2007,
foreign minister of Moldova,
Andrei Stratan, said at UN that Russian troups are in Republic of Moldova against the will of the Moldovan Government.
Administrative divisions
Moldova is divided into
thirty-two districts (
raioane, singular
raion); three municipalities (
Bălţi,
Chişinău,
Bender); and two autonomous regions (
Găgăuzia and
Transnistria). The cities of
Comrat and
Tiraspol also have municipality status, however not as first-tier subdivisions of Moldova, but as parts of the regions of Găgăuzia and Transnistria, respectively. The
status of Transnistria is however under dispute. Although it's
de jure part of Moldova and is recognized as such by the international community, Transnistria isn't
de facto under the control of the central government of Moldova. It is administered by an unrecognized breakaway authority under the name Pridnestrovian Moldovan Republic.
Further Information
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