The first foreign visit of Moldova’s Prime Minister Ion Chicu, which was to Russia, was followed by a scandal, with the Prime Minister getting into the media’s attention. 

And that happened not because he chose to go to Moscow and not to Washington, Brussels, Bucharest or Kyiv, but rather because he surprised more people with the statement that Russia offered to grant Moldova a loan of half a billion dollars for investment projects, though he was not able to say clearly what projects Russia intends to finance in Moldova, for what duration and under what conditions. 

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Another reason is that although Chicu met in Moscow with Dmitri Kozak, Russian Deputy Prime Minister and Putin’s emissary for the Transnistrian region (though officially, for relations with Moldova), he did not say anything about their discussions and possible agreements with the Russian side. 

And this happens when everyone knows that Moscow is pushing Moldova’s federalization. And President Igor Dodon, who is Putin’s vassal, has long given his agreement to sign any variant for the Transnistrian region status and to return Moldova under the ​​influence of Russia.

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And the last reason is that no one mentioned anything nothing about the invitation of Sergey Lavrov, Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, to visit Chișinău. 

In fact, Aureliu Ciocoi, Moldova’s Foreign Minister, invited Lavrov (and it’s in accordance with the protocol), but Ciocoi was part of the government delegation, led by Chicu. So it was up to Chicu, when speaking to the press, to report the overall outcomes of the visit. The problem, after all, is neither in Chicu nor in Ciocoi, nor in the fact that Chicu’s first external visit took place in Russia and not elsewhere. 

The problem is that Chicu and the Moldovan government delegation (and it was an official visit) went to Moscow with one working agenda and returned with another one. 

He went to discuss commercial and economic problems and ended up with a different agenda. Who introduced rectifications into it? Was it Lavrov? Was it Kozak and his entourage? Or perhaps Dodon, at the suggestion of Kozak and Lavrov?

Sergey Lavrov’s visit to Moldova won’t be an ordinary protocol visit, as it seems. Everyone knows that Russia doesn’t accept touring the world, as our officials are accustomed to, and has no time for courtesy visits. 

Under such circumstances, Ciocoi’s invitation for Lavrov to visit Moldova it’s rather a signal, a kind of SOS signal, considering that Ciocoi is one of the six presidential advisers, appointed by Dodon to be ministers and acting at the direct indication of the boss, as does the Prime Minister. And maybe it’s nothing serious, if we didn’t know whose servant Igor Dodon is.

For eight years Lavrov hasn’t been on an official visit to Moldova since 2011 when Iurie Leancă was Minister of Foreign Affairs in the Government led by Vlad Filat, Prime Minister from 2009 to 2013. 

Lavrov visited Moldova at a time when Russia, through the plan of Naryshkin, had succeeded in creating a left-right majority coalition in the Parliament formed from the Democratic Party, Liberal Democratic Party, Liberal Party, and Our Moldova Party obliged to create a strategic partnership with Russia in order to resolve the Transnistrian conflict. 

Then, as well as today, Russia’s diplomatic efforts were focused on the Transnistrian problem, because, depending on the status of the Transnistrian region, the military presence or non-presence of Russians on the Nistru river was also decided. However, things haven’t advanced. 

Moscow expected concessions from Chișinău, but the Liberal and the Liberal Democratic Parties rejected the idea of ​​Moldova’s federalization and asked Russia to withdraw its troops from the Nistru river and to respect Moldova’s territorial integrity in its internationally recognized borders.

After Vladimir Putin, Russia’s President helped by the Democratic Party succeeded in making Dodon president in 2016 the Transnistrian problem, which has got to a standstill, reappears as a priority on the agenda in Moscow’s relations with Chișinău. 

From the first days of his mandate, Dodon declared himself a supporter of the Russian proposal of solving the Transnistrian conflict⎼ Moldova’s federalization (we know about Dodon’s brotherhood and meetings in Tighina with Krasnoselsky). 

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After succeeding with the support of the Democratic Party to oust the Government led by Maia Sandu, on November 12, and appoint a new Cabinet of Ministers, totally controlled by Dodon Moscow is advancing even more on the federalization idea. 

Getting hold of the Presidency, the decision-making vote in Parliament, and the Government, Moscow is on the offensive now. And, in this sense, Lavrov’s visit to Chișinău is not a simple one. Lavrov comes to Chișinău to prepare Putin’s visit to Moldova, which Igor Dodon, according to an interview for Unimedia, transferred for 2020 after having waited for a whole year. 

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Clearly, Putin does not want to visit Moldova as a guest. Putin wants to come as a conqueror and to take revenge for the failure in 2003 when, over the night, Vladimir Voronin, president at that time, refused the signing of the Kozak Memorandum about Moldova’s federalization. 

Will it be different this time? If Putin’s visit in 2020 is successful, that could mean the beginning of the end for Moldova, so it matters how we react and act. 

We may fall prey to a Russian recolonization, as it was until 1991, but the Prut river may reach the Nistru river and Moldova will split into two forever. Deputy Octavian Țâcu’s statement that a powerful Unionist platform could be created in Parliament, is becoming increasingly relevant. The stick never had a single end.

On December 1, Moldova, together with the whole of Romania, will experience the feeling of Glory. It’s Romania’s National Day. The songs that accompanied our History will be heard on December 1 not only in Alba-Iulia, the capital of the Great Union. 

On December 1, Alba-Iulia will be everywhere in the Romanian space. It surely will not be the same as it was in 1918, but neither will it be as it was until 1991. And Dodon won’t like it either after Putin comes to Chișinău. If he ever comes.

Petru Grozavu,