On 5 April parliamentary elections took place in Moldova. The Communists won 50 percent of votes in the election, followed by the centre-right liberal Party with almost 13 percent of the votes, and the Liberal Democratic Party with 12 percent. A recount in Moldova's disputed election, ordered after violent protests against a Communist victory, have not brought any changes in the standing of parties in parliament.
Opposition parties demand a new election. They say their concern is fraud with voters' lists which they allege contain the names of dead voters and Moldovans working abroad but unable to come back into the country to vote.
The riots in Moldova puzzled a lot of Russian commentators. Even those who are usually ready to answer any question, interpreting any event in the former Soviet Union as a result of the continued rivalry between Russia and its erstwhile Western enemies, were at a loss to explain the events in Chisinau, where a crowd of angry youths seized the buildings of the parliament and the president’s residence, only to ransack and surrender them in a few hours. [see: Moldova: Worse Than a Revolution]
Voronin, Europe's only Communist leader, has long called for further integration with the West while preserving Moldova's longstanding ties with Russia. In power since 2001, he has moved closer to Moscow in recent years and praised the Kremlin's efforts at resolving an 18-year-old separatist rebellion in Russian-speaking Transdnieistria, one of the former Soviet Union's "frozen conflicts."
Sandwiched between Romania and Ukraine, Moldova is Europe's poorest country and home to another frozen conflict involving Russia, in the eastern region of Transnistria, similar to the Georgian disputes with the breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Some two thirds of Moldovans are of Romanian origin, speaking almost the same language. Most of Moldova's territory used to belong to Romania before the Soviet Union carved it out.
Russian interests are still very much present, as the separatist region of Transnistria, in Moldova's eastern part bordering Ukraine, is home to some 2,000 Russian troops and military equipment.
Source: EUobserver and BalkanInsight
Update [23/04/2009]: Topolanek calls for EU-led investigation in Moldova
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