Transdnistria conflict: End or beginning of settlement?

Not long ago both the public opinion and the expert community started to show signs of fatigue from the intense debate on the Transdnistria-Moldova settlement. The informational and emotional “overdose” of the initial stage of the Transdnistria customs blockade entailed a quick a decline of interest in the issue. Now many of the developments in the region and the information about it seem to attract less attention. Still this does not mean that nothing serious is happening. On the contrary, the Transdnistria-Moldova conflict is obviously entering a new phase and acquiring a new quality.

The Kosovo precedent and the recent one of Montenegro have become a major factor determining the geopolitics strategy of Transdnistria as well as of all the other unrecognized post-Soviet states. These formations’ struggle for independence has got a clear form and now refers to the present-day experience in addition to the historical one. The Montenegro scenario is now being discussed knowledgably by not only the political elites of the self-proclaimed republics, but also by ordinary intellectuals, clerks, or just people in the streets.

Hence one can draw a number of conclusions that make it possible to predict further developments of the situation.

Conclusion 1. Transdnistria’s stance in its struggle for being recognized internationally as an independent country will be even more uncompromising and persistent than it has ever been or could have been under different circumstances.

Belgium is currently presiding in the OCSE. Initially it was determined to achieve a substantial progress in the negotiations and to overcome the stagnation in the settlement of the conflict. Those plans have not been fulfilled so well and so efficiently as Belgium’s Foreign Minister Karel de Gucht might hope. The conflicting sides could not be brought to the negotiation table. It transpired that it is impossible to resolve the customs and border problem according to the Kyiv and Chisinau scenario. The Russian arsenals were never withdrawn from Transdnistria even despite the $10 mln offered for this purpose. The customs war hurt the prestige of the OCSE mission in Transdnistria.

Conclusion 2. The entire range of the peacekeeping instruments proposed by the OCSE for the settlement has to be revised considering the new circumstances.

The campaign to change the customs control regulations at the Ukraine-Moldova (Transdnistria) border took much more time and ended up being a lot more costly than the Moldavian and Ukrainian sides planned. Hopes of “Smirnov’s regime” falling in less than a month and of a mass migration of the Transdnistrian businesses under the Moldovan jurisdiction failed to materialize. The adaptability of the Transdnistrian economy to the demands of the mobilization model along with the humanitarian and economic assistance from Russia made the Transdnistrians highly resistive to pressure in the social and economic sense.

Conclusion 3. The Moldovan leaders underestimate their opponents, attempt to stigmatize them, thus causing the population’s protests, antagonizing their partner to the point when negotiations become impossible.

The new Ukrainian leadership’s attempt to take charge in the Transdnistrian settlement process and to drive the negotiations out of the stalemate was hardly a success. Kyiv’s preoccupation with a number of problems grave enough to be termed “war fronts” (the gas transportation “front”, the NATO issues, the Black Sea Navy problem, joining the WTO, the parliamentary crisis, and quite a few other ills in the domestic and international politics) prevented Ukraine from focusing on the Transdnistria direction and making any progress in implementing the “Yushenko plan”. And the customs operations control activities on the Ukrainian border made Transdnistrians no longer view Ukraine as a guarantor-country.

Conclusion 4. Ukraine failed to assess adequately its potential to lead the settlement process and in fact generated a new round of long-term problems with its bid for leadership.

Again, Russia found itself under a certain pressure to minimize its presence in the region. Parallel to the customs campaign calls for Moscow’s complying with the resolutions of the Istanbul OCSE summit intensified and attempts to withdraw its arsenals from Transdnistria resumed. In this situation Russia was predominantly on Transdnistria’s side focusing on the humanitarian assistance, as well as on the financial and moral support. So far the Russian peacekeeping and military presence in Transdnistria does not remain on the same level and in the old format; nor did Russia’s political standing suffer any damage. It was the Russian business, which owns a number of major companies in the region, who was hit worst by the blockade. This is a relatively new phenomenon (privatization started in Transdnistria only as late as in 2001).

Conclusion 5. In the future Russia will have to react to challenges of a new kind in the Transdnistria region, which are related not only to political, but also to economic factors and interests.

Conclusion 6, which is also an intermediate bottom line: The potential of the old negotiations model has been exhausted largely. Competing settlement plans reflecting the interests of one of the sides at the expense of the other are a matter of the past. A careful analysis and a cooperation of all the parties involved are prerequisites for any settlement plan. There must be no rash and no tributes to passing conjuncture when decisions are made on the future of an entire nation. And to this end each of the sides in the negotiations must at least be given acceptable conditions for its existence.

Tamara Guzenkova is one of the most insightful analysts of the unresolved territorial claim between Pridnestrovie and Moldova. This text was published exactly one year ago by the Strategic Culture Foundation's online magazine. Tiraspol Times reprints it here in order to let its readers decide for themselves if, one year later, her view of the situation has turned out to be accurate.