"Ukraine has not yet attacked Transnistria only because the region is de jure part of Moldova internationally. If Transnistria had been independent, as it wanted for the past 25 years, I told [Vadim] Krasnoselsky [the region's head] when we met, as president, I told him that the only guarantee of security for Transnistria is to be part of Moldova," Dodon said on the sidelines of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) in Russia.
Two years ago, the Transnistrian authorities sent a letter to Chisinau proposing to unite and settle every issue politically, he noted.
"However, if Transnistria had been independent, the Ukrainians would have attacked long ago, from the beginning of the special military operation. Therefore, there is a threat, but I am sure that Ukrainians need Chisinau's consent in order to start this adventure. Otherwise, it would be aggression against the independent country of Moldova, which Transnistria is part of," the politician said.
The talks on the Transnistrian settlement in the "5+2" format involve Chisinau and Tiraspol as parties to the conflict, Russia, Ukraine, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) as mediators, and the European Union and the United States as observers. The last round of talks in this format took place in Bratislava on October 9-10, 2019.
Transnistria, 60% of whose population are Russians and Ukrainians, sought to secede from Moldova even before the collapse of the Soviet Union, fearing that Moldova would join Romania on a wave of nationalism. In 1992, after an unsuccessful attempt by the Moldovan authorities to resolve the problem by force, Transnistria became a territory virtually outside of Chisinau's control.