Today, the OSCE Mission office hosted a meeting of political representatives from Pridnestrovie and the Republic of Moldova, which was attended by representatives of the 5+2 mediators and observers.
The meeting was mainly focused on the crisis situation in the transport sector. The Pridnestrovian side again raised the issue of a joint appeal to Ukraine regarding the suspension of an unjustified ban on vehicles with Pridnestrovian license plates passing through this country. Along with this, Pridnestrovie encouraged to set a positive example by cancelling exit restrictions introduced by the Moldovan side against the PMR-plated cars moving through the Moldovan-Romanian and Moldovan-Ukrainian borders. Kulminski once again took a destructive position, refusing to formulate such an appeal in a verbal or non-verbal form, without giving concrete arguments to justify such a negative approach that provokes massive violations of human rights.
At the same time, the Moldovan side reiterated its principled readiness to allow Pridnestrovian reanimobiles to be unrestrictedly registered in the Vehicle Registration Offices, but the relevant changes to the regulatory framework have not been adopted yet. Moldova’s approach to the issue of passenger and cargo carriers’ participation in the international road traffic still does not allow reaching compromise solutions in the near future. Pridnestrovie considers it necessary to urgently start discussing options to implement paragraph 15 of the April 24, 2018 Protocol Decision regarding the admission of cargo and passenger transport to be registered in the Vehicle Registration Offices with the issuance of neutral-design license plates. To achieve that, the Political Representative from the Republic of Moldova was asked to immediately send the Republic of Moldova’s vision in the context of the draft Protocol Decision previously submitted by Pridnestrovie. However, the demanded solution is being delayed by the Moldovan side in every possible way.
During the meeting, the parties discussed the prospects of a Permanent Conference meeting in November this year in Stockholm. Both Political Representatives spoke in favor of convening the round without preconditions, outlined briefly their own vision of the agenda and called on the OSCE Chairpersonship-in-Office to send an invitation in the near future.
At the end of the meeting, the parties expressed their support for resuming the active work of field expert (working) groups to achieve concrete results within the framework of the Berlin Plus process. The parties agreed to hold another meeting before the end of this week.
