Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov warned on Thursday that any action against Russian “peace soldiers” in Transnistria, Moldova, would be seen as an attack on Russia itself.
“Everyone must understand that any action that endangers the security of our army will be considered, according to international law, as an attack on Russia,” Lavrov said.
Like Ukraine before the war launched by Moscow on February 24 this year, Moldova also has a small breakaway region, Transnistria, which is armed and supported by Russia.
“As far as our interests are concerned, our peacekeeping forces are stationed there… guarding Europe’s largest ammunition depot in Kolbasna,” Lavrov was quoted as saying by the Russian Interfax news agency.
Transnistria announced its separation from Moldova after a brief civil war in the early 1990s, but no country recognized independence, including Russia.
Moscow maintains 1,500 soldiers in the territory, which it frames as a peacekeeping force.
Transnistria is a narrow strip of land in eastern Moldova that borders Ukraine.
It has a population of about 470,000 inhabitants, mostly Russians and Ukrainians.
Since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, the authorities in kyiv have feared that Moscow could use Transnistria to launch attacks in the southwest of the country.
In May, the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces even warned that armed groups and Russian troops in Transnistria were prepared to go into combat.
The deputy commander of Russia’s Central Military District, General Rustam Minnekayev, said in April that the government of southern Ukraine would also help separatists in Transnistria, “where there are also cases of oppression of the Russian-speaking population.”
Protecting the Russian-speaking population in eastern Ukraine was one of Moscow’s justifications for invading the neighboring country.
The Moldovan authorities have insisted that they will regain control of Transnistria only through negotiations, rejecting any armed solution.
Source: TSF
