MOLDOVA: Moldova's separatist Dnestr region votes to confirm 16 years of independence and moves toward joining Russia

The Republic of Moldova's break-away Dnestr region votes on Sunday (September 17) to put a public stamp of approval on 16 years of de facto independence, as well as take steps towards eventually joining the Russian Federation, even though it doesn't share a border with that country. Rallies in Tiraspol, the capital of the Dnestr region, have expressed support for independence. Some 400,000 voters in Dnestr, a land-locked sliver of land wedged between Moldova and Ukraine, will be asked two questions: whether they support independence and subsequent merger with Russia, or whether they reject independence and wish to remain a part of Moldova. The majority ethnic Russian population of Dnestr fears becoming a minority if they stay part of Moldova. "We think that the fate of our republic will be decided,'' said Olga Chernichenko, a pensioner, as she walked with her grandson on Saturday (September 16). "Of course we want to be accepted by Russia, because we think, I think that this is our future. The future of myself and my grandson. The only way is to be with Russia. We don't see any other way," she added. Dozens of young people danced in a square in Tiraspol burning an effigy of Moldova's president, Vladimir Voronin on Saturday. At a rally in a city stadium, participants wave yellow flags and wore t-shirts incongruously bearing portraits of Latin American revolutionary Che Guevara. "No to Voronin!" they shouted, referring to Moldovan President Vladimir Voronin. "No to war! No to terror!" In March, Voronin criticised Russia for not having withdrawn troops and weapons from Dnestr under international agreements with the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). Russia still has some 1,500 troops in Dnestr which it says are necessary to guard large arms stockpiles dating back to the Soviet-era. Western countries say they will not recognise Sunday's vote in Dnestr. Russia has urged Europe to take heed of the plebiscite. "We want to live in peace, and so that no one makes slaves of us,'' said Igor Smirnov, the self-styled president of Dnestr, at a rally in a Tiraspol stadium, "That means we are with Russia." Russia's Foreign Ministry this week chided Western capitals for declaring the vote illegitimate in advance, saying that it was, "hardly correct and politically farsighted to ignore, or moreover to treat in a disrespectful way, the expression of the people's will". "People themselves determine their fate, and I believe that on September 17 the people of Dnestr will confirm this,'' said Igor Smirnov, the self-styled president of Dnestr. "Everyone should vote and express their opinion. I urge you to take part in our national referendum. I wish you the best,'' he said. Dnestr, which accounts for one-eighth of tiny Moldova's area but 40 percent of its industry, declared independence in 1990 on fears that Moldova's Romanian-speaking majority would one day choose to join Romania to the south. That has never occurred but Moldova and Dnestr, which was backed by the Russian 14th Army, fought a brief war in the months following the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union. Moldova offers broad autonomy to Dnestr and says the Russian army's presence and support for the separatists, backed by nationalists in Moscow, are the main impediments to a settlement. Dnestr's leaders say nothing short of independence will do and have wooed voters with promises of Russian passports, pensions and education once unification with Moscow takes shape. Years of mediation led by the OSCE, along with the United States, European Union, Russia and Ukraine, have made little progress. The OSCE rejects the poll outright, dismissing the questions as "suggestive" and decrying a lack of freedoms in the region. "The necessary preconditions for a free and fair vote, a free and fair referendum in Transdnestr, are not in place,'' said Louis O'Neill, head of the OSCE in Moldova. "There is no freedom of the press to speak of; no freedom of assembly; it's very difficult to form a political party; there aren't competing ideas and voices in the market place of ideas. And of course there is the ever present pressure, sometimes overt, sometimes subtle, of the organs of state security that can have a chilling effect on the expression of free thought and different ideas. So no, of course, for all these reasons, there's no way that the OSCE, or any country, including the Russian Federation, will recognize the results of this referendum as legitimate.'' The Republic of Georgia, another former Soviet state, has joined Moldova in saying that Russia abets separatists in two breakaway regions, including South Ossetia, where a similar independence referendum is planned for November. The Dnestr and South Ossetian separatists have taken heart recently from Montenegro's independence referendum and talks expected to lead to independence in Kosovo. From 1994 to 2004, Russia waged a brutal campaign against the break-away Chechen republic, claiming that defending the principle of territorial integrity was vital to the survival of the entire country.

ITN Source | September 17, 2006

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