“We see this not as an energy crisis, but as a security crisis caused by Russia to destabilize Moldova both economically and socially,” Olga Roshka, a foreign policy adviser to the president of Moldova, told the BBC.
“It is clear that this is a shaping operation ahead of parliamentary elections in 2025 to create demand for the return of pro-Russian forces to power.”
Relations between Moldova and Moscow are strained.
While part of the USSR, the country began negotiations to join the EU and turned its back on Russia even more decisively after its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
President Maia Sandu was re-elected last year despite evidence of a massive campaign against her being waged from Moscow.
It didn’t stop.
Before her inauguration, Russia’s foreign intelligence agency, the SVR, issued a surprising statement falsely claiming that it planned to take back Transnistria by force to restore energy supplies. He described the president as “crazy” and “emotionally unstable.”
Analyst Yakub Penkovsky agrees that the Kremlin is using Kiev’s decision to ban the transit of Russian gas.
“This is an excuse to create some political and social problems in Moldova,” he claims. “Electricity prices have already risen about six times in three years and people are angry.”
As the humanitarian situation in Transnistria worsens, the pressure on Chisinau will increase. But Tiraspol refuses any help, even generators.
“They will create a narrative that Chisinau will freeze Transnistria into submission,” Olga Roshka believes.
And even if Tiraspol wants to buy gas elsewhere, the blow to its economy could be catastrophic.
“The prices here would go up, including for heating and food. But pensions here are small, and there is no work,” Dmitriy from Bendery, in the buffer zone on the edge of Transnistria, told me.
He says that people are barely “hanging on” there. Now life in other parts of Moldova will also become more difficult.
“Russia can wait for the elections, and then the non-European parties will probably win,” predicts Yakub Penkovski.
“Because Maya Sandu can talk about joining the EU. But what good is that if people don’t have money for electricity and gas?”
“This is the goal of Russia.”
