Foreign Minister Vitaly Ignatiev held a meeting with German Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to Moldova Margret Uebber, who is on her first visit to Pridnestrovie after taking office.
The interlocutors continued the dialogue started during the meeting of the German diplomat with President Vadim Krasnoselsky and Chairman of the Government Alexander Rosenberg. The working discussion was basically focused on the negotiation process between Pridnestrovie and the Republic of Moldova.
At the Ambassador’s request, Vitaly Ignatiev briefed on the current comprehensive negotiation mechanism that includes high-level contacts between the sides, meetings of the Permanent Conference in the 5+2 format, meetings of political representatives and expert (working) groups of the sides.
He also noted Moldova’s destructive behaviour in the dialogue with Pridnestrovie seen in the systematic refusal to negotiate, non-fulfillment of agreements already reached, and politicization of even purely humanitarian issues, such as the import of medication to Pridnestrovie. As the PMR Foreign Minister said, from nearly 200 agreements signed between the sides over the past decades none are fully functional today.
With regard to the current state of dialogue with the Moldovan side, Vitaly Ignatiev said that it is “far from dynamic” and that the potential of available negotiating platforms is practically not realized. In this context, he particularly stressed the importance of equidistant, transparent and impartial mediation in the Moldova-Pridnestrovie settlement.
“Moldova is now pressuring Pridnestrovie comprehensively. This will continue as long as the international community allows Moldova to do so. But this is a wrong, dead-end path that leads to confrontation. I believe that rational international mediation has great potential,” the diplomat said citing the positive experience of the 2016 German OSCE Chairmanship as an example.
Vitaly Ignatiev separately mentioned Moldova’s refusal to implement the Berlin+ package stressing the impossibility for the negotiation process to move forward without implementing its basic agreements.
Concluding the meeting, the sides concurred that the Moldova-Pridnestrovie conflict must be resolved in an exclusively peaceful way and agreed to continue working contacts on the whole range of topical issues of cooperation.
