-----Original Message----- From: Institute for War & Peace Reporting [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, November 05, 2004 3:29 PM Subject: Balkan Crisis Report No. 524
WELCOME TO IWPR'S BALKAN CRISIS REPORT, No. 524, November 05, 2004 MOLDOVA FOCUS COMMENT: IN SEARCH OF A SOLUTION It is in the interests of both Russia and the European Union to solve a problem knocking at both their doors. By Nicholas Whyte in Brussels NO END IN SIGHT There are few hopes that Moldova's bitter 13-year conflict with its breakaway Slav region can be resolved in the near future. By IWPR contributors in Chisinau, Tiraspol and Bucharest MEDIA SERVES TO DEEPEN DIVISIONS A lack of solidarity, low professional standards and deep divides plague journalism in Moldova and Transdniester. By Natalia Angheli-Zaicenco in Chisinau CRIME AND POVERTY HAUNT DISPUTED LANDS Life is difficult for the people of Moldova and Transdniester, and confusion over the unofficial border that divides them only adds to the misery. By Corneliu Rusnac in Chisinau MOLDOVA FOCUS COMMENT: IN SEARCH OF A SOLUTION It is in the interests of both Russia and the European Union to solve a problem knocking at both their doors. By Nicholas Whyte in Brussels Moldova is soon to become one of the European Union's newest neighbours. With the expected entry of Romania in 2007, the EU will share a long frontier with the poorest country in Europe, which suffers from an uneasy sense of identity and uncertain borders. The unrecognised separatist region of Transdniester has been out of the control of Moldova's capital, Chisinau, since 1992 and is essentially a mafia-run fiefdom which survives thanks only to criminal profits and support from certain circles in Russia and Ukraine - and the security presence of the 14th Russian Army. The region is a prime location for money laundering and the production and illegal export of weapons. Firearms produced in and trafficked from Transdniester are said to lack serial numbers, making them untraceable and therefore ideal for organised crime. In the current situation, such activities can be conducted in and from Transdniester very easily and with impunity, as international law enforcement bodies are not allowed there, and international governmental and non-governmental organisations are unable to operate normally within its borders. As a result, it is difficult to provide training for officials or provide expertise on legislation, awareness-raising campaigns and witness protection programmes relating to trafficking issues when the authorities are not recognised internationally and are resistant to international pressure and intervention. The civil war in Moldova was relatively mild by post-Soviet standards when you consider the Georgian civil war, the Armenian-Azerbaijani war over Nagorny Karabakh, or the decade of implosion in Chechnya. But this does not make a long-term solution any easier to find. A Russian attempt to break the deadlock, the so-called Kozak Memorandum of November 2003, foundered on two issues: the constitutional set-up of a reunited Moldovan state, and Russia's continued military presence in Transdniester. Russian officials admitted afterwards that their negotiator Dmitry Kozak - an adviser to President Vladimir Putin - failed to get the necessary buy-in to the plan from Washington and the EU via the existing OSCE negotiating mechanism. However, the EU's new European Neighbourhood Policy - which is designed to improve stability and security in areas soon to border on the EU following its expansion - has raised expectations in Moldova. The European Commission will shortly be publishing an Action Plan for the country, which should contain clear benchmarks for the country for development of democracy, rule of law and human rights. After an initial period when Chisinau got a relatively good bill of health on this score, the 2003 local elections and continuing state harassment of journalists and media indicate a worrying trend. A regime of visa sanctions against the Transdniestrian leadership, imposed in early 2003 in frustration with their failure to move the peace process forward, was intensified in July 2004 in reaction to Tiraspol's harassment of Moldovan-language schools. Tensions also rose in the divided town of Tighina/Bendery in autumn 2004, when Transdniestrian militia seized control of a vital railway station. The EU has a clear interest in helping to clean up the serious problems caused by poverty and endemic crime in Moldova, as both threaten to bring even greater problems with Romania's succession in perhaps fewer than three years' time. And whether or not one believes Chisinau's claims that Transdniestrian arms are flowing to Caucasian rebels, it surely cannot be in Russia's long-term interests to allow the dispute to continue to fester. At present, international actors are unwilling to invest resources in Moldova; the painful memory of last year's botched Kozak plan lingers. What is needed is a joint EU-Russia effort to find a solution, in the context of the European Neighbourhood Policy and also of Russian's 1999 commitment to withdraw its troops and equipment from Moldova, and specifically from Transdniestria. The EU's designated new external relations commissioner, Benita Ferrero-Waldner, has had some experience of the issue from her time as Chair-in-office of the OSCE in 2000. Perhaps Brussels and Moscow will find the necessary time and energy to resolve this comparatively minor problem soon. Nicholas Whyte is Europe Programme Director of the International Crisis Group in Brussels. NO END IN SIGHT There are few hopes that Moldova's bitter 13-year conflict with its breakaway Slav region can be resolved in the near future. By IWPR contributors in Chisinau, Tiraspol and Bucharest The Republic of Moldova, a tiny nation sandwiched between Romania and Ukraine, has struggled to cope with the independence it gained when the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991. Since then, it has gone from being the "breadbasket and vineyard" of the former superpower to the poorest country in Europe, where 80 per cent of the 4.4 million-strong population lives below the poverty line. Aside from whispers of corruption and worries over criminal activities such as people-trafficking, the EU also views Moldova with concern because the government there has had no control over 11 per cent of its territory for nearly 14 years. The breakaway republic of Transdniester, a sliver of land on the eastern, left bank of the river Dniester close to Moldova's official border with Ukraine, declared independence from the then Soviet republic in 1990 and has remained defiantly separatist ever since. Around 1,600 Russian troops and 20,000 tonnes of weaponry - the remnants of the Soviet 14th Army - act as a security and police force in Transdniester, which has retained its close links to Moscow. No government or embassy recognises this breakaway nation, which is now notorious as a haven for those who would traffic people, guns and drugs across the often-porous borders of the former Soviet republics. Before the Second World War, most of what is now the Moldovan state was part of Romania, but the land was then annexed by the Soviet Union. In the late Eighties, the largely Russian and Ukrainian population east of the Dniester - who traditionally feel closer to Moscow than to the Moldovan capital Chisinau - grew increasingly concerned that the central government wanted the republic to join Romania. The adoption of a law naming Moldovan - a language virtually identical to Romanian - as the official state language in 1989 intensified these fears. It prompted Russian-speaking officals across the Dniester to set up their own administration in the city of Tiraspol and declare the area independent. A short but bloody conflict followed in 1992, resulting in the deaths of more than 700 people in the six months before Russian troops intervened to bring fighting to a close. Twelve years on, opinions are still bitterly divided as to the root cause of the problems - leaving little hope that the situation can be normalised and the country reunited. Moldova's deputy minister for reunification, Victor Postolache, said, "The conflict started because of the desire of a group of former Soviet officials to keep control over Transdniester, a region that should be used as a gateway to the whole Balkan region." Ilie Ilascu, a former political prisoner who spent nine years in jail in Tiraspol after the conflict, agrees with this assessment. "Russian geopolitical interests were the only source of the war in this region," he told IWPR. But politicians and analysts on the other side of the river dismiss these claims, insisting that Moldova's desire to rejoin Romania left them with little choice but to protect the interests of the Russian-speaking community. Grigory Volovoi, a former Transdniester politician who now works as a journalist, said, "The initial reaction of our leaders to the adoption of the 1989 language law was to demand its amendment, and when this failed, to insist that a free economic zone to be created in the region. "When these requests were rejected and certain threats followed, a referendum for the region's independence was organised and a new kind of state was created." Five years after the breakaway republic declared its independence - and following intense mediation by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, OSCE, involving Russia and Ukraine - Chisinau and Tiraspol finally produced a "memorandum of understanding", which guaranteed a certain amount of autonomy for the region. This was followed by an agreement signed at an OSCE summit in Istanbul in 1999, during which Russia agreed to end its military presence in the region by the end of 2002. As yet, no timetable for this withdrawal has been established, in spite of the OSCE putting aside 30 million US dollars to help finance it. In the meantime, plans to deploy an OSCE peacekeeping force have met with considerable resistance in Tiraspol. "If such steps are taken, it would lead to a new outbreak of conflict - including an armed one," Transdniester's deputy security minister Oleg Gudymo warned recently. Hopes for a peaceful solution were raised in November 2003, with a proposal drafted by Moscow which envisaged turning Moldova into a federation in which Transdniester would retain its governing and legislative bodies, including control of its own budget and fiscal policy, and would have its own language laws. Moldovan president Vladimir Voronin, after initially making positive noises about the proposal, went on to reject it following widespread opposition in Chisinau to what was seen as a plan to undermine the sovereignty of the state. The idea of federalism is viewed with suspicion in the breakaway republic, too. "Most people [here] are totally against any kind of federal union with Moldova, but they are also aware that economic cooperation between the two sides is still necessary," said Sergey Ilchenko, senior editor of the Dnestrovsky Kurier daily. Grigory Marakutsa, speaker of the Transdniestrian parliament, said that local officials were still discussing the construction of a common state, in line with the wishes of the international community. "But more and more voices [here] say that these negotiations are useless as it will soon be quite possible to build a totally independent state outside Moldova," he said at a recent press conference. The republic's foreign affairs committee announced earlier this month that a new referendum - where citizens would be asked to choose between continued negotiations with Moldova on federalisation, or consolidating independent status - was in the planning stages, although there was no mention of when this plebiscite would be held. Observers familiar with conditions in Transdniester doubt such a referendum would be credible. "There is no democratically elected government and those who want to express their political opinions are afraid, as dissidents are followed by the political police," said one Russian-speaking journalist, who spoke to IWPR on condition of anonymity. Across the river in the rest of the country, where the majority of the population is of Moldovan origin, the idea of an independent Trandniester fills many with unease. Stefan Jurja, a former soldier who fought for Moldova during the 1992 conflict, said, "People [in Transdniester] have to put a stop to their aggressive politics and illegitimate actions. Unfortunately, I am afraid that Russia will ultimately succeed in imposing its views in favour of an independent Transdniester." Relations between Chisinau and Tiraspol were further strained in summer 2004 following Transdniester's decision to close down schools and kindergartens that taught the Moldovan language using the Latin script. Transdniester has retained the Soviet-era Cyrillic alphabet that was designed to differentiate the language from Romanian, while Moldova has switched to Latin letters. The heavy-handed school closures outraged the international community, which slammed the decision as "linguistic cleansing". This row largely went over the heads of the population on both sides of the river, who had more pressing things to worry about. "Many citizens have no opinion on the conflict because of poverty," said Oazu Nantoi from the Institute for Public Policies in Chisinau. "They are looking first of all to their own urgent economical and personal needs, and to the country's problems after that. "One survey asked Moldovans how they saw prospects for federalisation, and 80 per cent of those polled replied that they didn't know anything about it and had no opinion either way." Under such conditions, analysts believe that the only possible solution will involve a continuation of the dialogue between Chisinau and Tiraspol, under close international supervision. "Russia, Ukraine, the EU, and the United States have to find a common stance on the issue of Moldovan federalisation, and organise a meeting between Moldovan and Transdniestran leaders in order to overcome the political crisis," said Andrei Safonov, a political analyst in Transdniester. "There is no other solution if Moldova is to become a stable and prosperous country at the EU's borders." Moldovan president Vladimir Voronin remains defiant, but concedes that any resolution to this long-running and damaging conflict will ultimately depend on the international community - particularly Moscow. "The Transdniester regime is and will remain a puppet ruled by Russia and Ukraine," said Voronin recently. "But I will never allow this region - this huge, black and corrupt morasse - to get away." MEDIA SERVES TO DEEPEN DIVISIONS A lack of solidarity, low professional standards and deep divides plague journalism in Moldova and Transdniester. By Natalia Angheli-Zaicenco in Chisinau A group of journalists picket the entrance to the National Radio building in the Moldovan capital Chisinau, yet others continue to work. Another group go on hunger strike to draw attention to censorship and poor working conditions, while their colleagues diligently study a "media freedom" initiative by the Moldovan president. This is a snapshot of the present-day media scene in Moldova, which suffers from a lack of solidarity between journalist, bad employment practices and poor reporting standards. Journalists remain largely divided along political, linguistic and even geographical lines, while international surveys all point to a worsening of media freedom in the country. Despite a large number of outlets, few newspapers have a circulation exceeding 10,000, and a limited number of broadcasters can boast a significant amount of original programming in their output. Most newspapers are poorly-designed tabloids which run politically-biased articles. The majority of radio and television channels re-broadcast foreign programmes, largely from Russia. In the absence of advertising, media organisations largely depend on different forms of sponsorship for survival. As a result, they often run "advertorials" and paid-for "expos�s", and hence have a tendency to hire young or inexperienced reporters who will write whatever they are ordered to. Indeed, according to a recent survey, two-thirds of Moldovan journalists have been in the profession for less than a decade, and only a quarter admit to having had any professional training in the last five years. They seldom make more than 100 US dollars a month, and most have to moonlight in order to make ends meet. Editors prefer their reporters to cover a range of topics rather than concentrating on specific beats. As a result, specialty journalism - and especially investigative reporting - is underdeveloped. The few investigative journalists are routinely denied access to information of public interest, and are frequently harassed. In June 2004, Alina Anghel of Timpul weekly was hospitalised with concussion and a broken arm after being attacked in broad daylight near her apartment. Anghel, who had written extensively about cases of government corruption, believed the attack was directly related to her work. Several weeks later the police claimed to have arrested the attacker, but the reporter suspects he wasn't the real culprit. Libel suits are another method employed by the authorities to thwart reporters. The law does not impose a ceiling on libel awards, which has left some media close to bankruptcy. Journalists frequently fail to respond to these challenges in an effective manner. One reason for this is persisting linguistic divisions. The media scene is split between Moldovan- and Russian-language players, and their journalists often belong to different professional associations. Moreover, events reported in Russian-language media are frequently presented very differently in Moldovan outlets and vice versa. And sometimes, there's a significant variation in the range of issues covered by both. Under these circumstances, it is hardly surprising that journalists rarely put up a united front in the face of threats to their profession. Such was the case of the strike at TeleRadio Moldova, TRM, in the summer of 2004. Protests were sparked by what were believed to have been unfair staffing procedures. As part of efforts to turn TRM from a state into a public service broadcaster, the authorities decided to replace its entire staff, despite concerns from local and international media experts. After the new recruits were announced, TRM journalists broke into the National Radio building on July 27 - where the selection committee had been meeting - claiming that the hiring process lacked transparency and that "inconvenient" members of staff had been sacked. The protesters demanded the resignation of the selection committee as well as the rest of the TRM management. The latter responded by stripping them of their journalist IDs and banning them from the premises. In August, the stand-off escalated and police used force to disperse a crowd of protesting journalists. International watchdog organisations deplored the authorities' heavy-handed approach towards the protesters and called for the TRM recruitment policy to be reviewed. At home, however, there was a distinct lack of sympathy amongst their colleagues. In the meantime, TRM's management continued to ignore the protesters' demands and refused to offer them airtime to express their views. The journalists are now attempting to sue the station's executives for incompetence and several of the former have gone on hunger strike. Another problem faces by journalists is their limited access to a sizeable part of Moldova - which hampers balanced and comprehensive coverage of the region. Less than 60 kilometres east of Chisinau, the Transdniester region is effectively run as a separate state. The media is under the tight control of the authorities, and visiting journalists are viewed with suspicion. Reporters from Chisinau-based media, as well as colleagues from overseas, have had a series of run-ins with the Transdniestrian police. In September 2004, TRM cameraman Dinu Mija spent several days in jail for "illegally entering the territory of the Transdniestrian republic and offering resistance to the authorities". Mija was seized and his camera smashed as he tried to film a protest by railway employees in the town of Tighina. Earlier that month, a visiting BBC film crew was detained for several hours after attempting to shoot footage of a Soviet-era munitions dump. According to a Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty report, Tiraspol accused the team of "possibly collecting military intelligence for NATO or the United States". Soviet-style conspiracy theories are rife in the region's media, and Transdniestrians are constantly being urged to remain "vigilant" in the face of "Moldova's subversive activities". The tone of coverage becomes even more confrontational whenever tensions between the authorities and local leaders mount. In summer 2004, as negotiations on the status of the region reached their current nadir, Transdniestrian newspapers were full of page-long editorials calling on the local population to stand up in the face of Moldova's plans to "launch military aggression". Meanwhile, newspapers in Moldova were focusing on the plight of several Moldovan-language schools closed by the authorities in Transdniestria, where Russian is the dominant language. The communication gap is enforced by Trandsniestrian officials, who discourage local journalists from contacting the authorities in Chisinau to check facts or hear the Moldovan side of the story. Reporters who disobey this unwritten law are routinely summoned for questioning. With such intimidation, the poor communication between journalists, the biased nature of much of the political reporting, and the overall shortage of money and resources, the people of Moldova and Transdniester are being sold short. They are served a skewed and fragmented picture of reality, and there is no section of the media that can be relied upon to act as public watchdog. Natalia Angheli-Zaicenco is senior consultant at the Independent Journalism Centre in Chisinau. CRIME AND POVERTY HAUNT DISPUTED LANDS Life is difficult for the people of Moldova and Transdniester, and confusion over the unofficial border that divides them only adds to the misery. By Corneliu Rusnac in Chisinau Sergiu Nirca worked hard all year to grow barley for the farmer's association he runs in Cocieri, some 50 kilometres northeast of the Moldovan capital Chisinau. But when he tried to shift the crop to market, he was penalised by the Russian-speaking troops who police the neighbouring breakaway republic of Transdniester. "At the end of August, Transdniestrian custom officials confiscated a truck full of barley from me, and they took another one a week later, claiming I was breaking their custom rules," said Nirca, unshaven and bleary-eyed after weeks of stress. "Now I have been forced to leave my entire crop there." The farmer added that well over 200 people in this impoverished part of Moldova have had similar trouble along the porous border with the breakaway republic of Transdniester. Jurisdiction here is blurred and the Moldovan authorities are rarely able to intervene to help those caught in the middle. The village of Cocieri is one of five settlements situated on the right, western bank of the river Dniester, in an area formally under the jurisdiction of Moldovan authorities, but effectively controlled by the self-proclaimed Transdniestrian Republic. Chisinau's writ does not run to this area, which is policed by Russian soldiers. Transdniester, where the majority is of Russian or Ukrainian origin, declared independence from Moldova in 1990 over fears that the central authorities would seek unification with Romania. The breakaway entity was tacitly supported by Russia, which sees the area as its gateway to the Balkans and south-eastern Europe. The rebel area's capital Tiraspol has changed little since Soviet times and remains defiantly Russian-leaning. Downtown, a granite statue of Lenin looms over a tank which symbolises Moscow's victory over Nazi Germany in the Second World War. The breakaway republic uses its own ruble currency, and the remnants of the old 14th Soviet Army acts as its defence force. The links to Moscow stretch to its president Igor Smirnov, a Russian Federation citizen who has adopted a Soviet style of rule. As Transdniester has not been recognised by any government, its citizens face difficulties if they want to travel abroad, as their passports are not internationally recognised. As a result, some 90 per cent of the population holds dual citizenship. Tiraspol estimates that 100,000 people use Moldovan passports and 80,000 people travel on Russian passports, while 20,000 rely on Ukrainian papers or documents from other former Soviet states. Lack of recognition by the international community also means Tiraspol has not been to enter into legitimate business transactions to boost its economy. As a result, the area has become synonymous with black marketeering, corruption and crime. >From 1998, Transdniestrian custom officials - backed by the military - began to demanding arbitrary taxes and even confiscating property from people in some borderline areas like Cocieri that technically lie outside their territory. "This happens mainly during the autumn season when farmers harvest their crops," Nirca told IWPR, adding that other villagers have had their gas or water supply cut off, or have been removed from their jobs. Grigore Policinschi, a local government chief on the Moldovan side of the river Dniester, is pessimistic about the area's prospects, "While people here are under constant pressure from the Transdniester regime, Moldova's government is just offering us advice and asking us not to react to any provocation." Officials in Chisinau the Transdniester region is causing huge losses to the Moldovan economy, including billions of dollars lost every year through arms smuggling and non-taxed trade. Prime Minister Vasile Tarlev recently told the media that many of Moldova's economic problems can be blamed on its inability to control all of its state borders and collect customs duties. He estimated that Moldova's economy would see tenfold growth if only it could get hold of these revenues. As things stand, signs of poverty can be seen almost everywhere in Moldova. Many country villages - typically with crosses and statues of Christ or the Virgin Mary by the roadside - are half-empty because so many young people have gone abroad to find work and send money home to support their families. It is thought that 14 per cent of Moldova's 4.4 million population - mostly young people - have left their homeland in search of jobs since the republic became independent 13 years ago. In the Soviet period, Moldova's fertile landscape supported orchards and huge vineyards that produced wine for the Communist bloc. But with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the loss of its centralised market and economy, around half the Moldovan population now scratches a living from subsistence farming. But even that economic activity has shrunk to the third of the size it was a decade ago. The tiny republic, sandwiched between Romania and Ukraine, is now the poorest state in Europe. The average income is 30 US dollars a month, and the quality of life is uniformly miserable - cold apartments, empty refrigerators, hand-me-down clothing, and a hope that things just have to get better. Only a few thousand at the top enjoy any real benefits - many of them former Communist insiders who profited from post-Soviet disintegration by snapping up former state industries at bargain prices. They are to be found at restaurants such as the capital's Coliseum, where customers wash down Italian dishes with Moldovan wine. The bill for three is similar to the average monthly wage earned by the bulk of the population. In another part of Chisinau, unemployed former engineer Vitalie Lupu looks up at the decaying Soviet-era concrete flats that loom over the city. He blames confusion and inertia for the bulk of the problems facing Moldova - and believes that a blurred identity following the collapse of the Soviet Union has not helped the people adjust. "I really don't know what kind of country Moldova is," he shrugged. "It's a country with porous borders, one which does not control its entire territory, and with an official language which is called Moldovan despite it being very similar to Romanian." Lupu, who is now taking accountancy classes in an attempt to boost his career prospects, sees no improvement in Moldova's political future. "Unfortunately, we are still under very strong Russian influence as we are dependent on fuel imports from there," he said. "And Moscow still controls all the important factories in the region. How can Moldova develop under such conditions?" Corneliu Rusnac is a journalist with the independent news agency Basa Press. ****************** VISIT IWPR ON-LINE: www.iwpr.net *************** IWPR's network of leading correspondents in the region provides in-depth analysis on events and issues affecting the Balkans. The reports are published online in English, Serbian and Albanian. They are also available via e-mail. Balkan Crisis Report is supported by the Department for International Development, the European Commission, the Swedish International Development and Cooperation Agency, The Netherlands Ministry for Foreign Affairs, and other funders. IWPR also acknowledges general support from the Ford Foundation. For further details on this project, other information services and media programmes, visit IWPR's website: www.iwpr.net All our reporting services are available free of charge online and via e-mail subscription. To subscribe go to: http://www.iwpr.net/sub_form.html Editor-in-Chief: Anthony Borden; Managing Editor: Yigal Chazan; Senior Editor: John MacLeod; Editor: Alison Freebairn; Balkan Programme Manager: Gordana Igric; Editor/Trainer: Marcus Tanner. The Institute for War & Peace Reporting is a London-based independent non-profit organisation supporting regional media and democratic change. Lancaster House, 33 Islington High Street, London N1 9LH, United Kingdom. Tel: +44 (0)20 7713 7130, Fax: +44 (0)20 7713 7140 Web: www.iwpr.net The opinions expressed in Balkan Crisis Report are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of the publication or of IWPR. ISSN: 1477-7932 Copyright (c) 2004 The Institute for War & Peace Reporting BALKAN CRISIS REPORT No. 524 ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Make a clean sweep of pop-up ads. Yahoo! Companion Toolbar. Now with Pop-Up Blocker. Get it for free! http://us.click.yahoo.com/L5YrjA/eSIIAA/yQLSAA/RR.olB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> EuroAtlantic Club: http://www.europe.org.ro/euroatlantic_club/ *** Birou de traduceri autorizate. Oana Gheorghiu - tel/fax: 252.8681 / [EMAIL PROTECTED] Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/romania_eu_list/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
