Moldova’s first president, Mircea Snegur, died last night at the age of 83 as a victim of a long-term illness, digital media outlets in the former Soviet republic, located between Ukraine and Romania, reported today.
An agricultural engineer by profession, Snegur headed a scientific research center for agricultural crops in the city of Balti, the country’s second largest, between 1978 and 1981, where he started his career in the Communist Party of the then Soviet Socialist Republic of Moldova. (PCRSSM).
In 1985 he was appointed secretary of the Central Committee of the PCRSSM and four years later he rose to the leadership of the Supreme Soviet of the republic.
Later, in December 1991, in the midst of the collapse of the Soviet Union, Snegur, who had become a moderate nationalist, was elected president of the republic in direct elections, boycotted by the opposition and in which he was the only candidate. .
He tried for a second term in 1996, but was defeated in the second round by then-parliament speaker Petru Lucinschi.
Source: DN
