“OLVIA-PRESS”

FAIRNESS BUT NOT TREATIES RECONCILE PEOPLES.

The President of the Dniester Moldavian Republic Igor Smirnov came to such a conclusion when finishing his speech, which he declared on August 31^st at the press conference devoted to the 12^th anniversary of the DMR foundation. Journalists from Dniestria, Russia, Belarus, Moldova, the Ukraine, and France arrived to the DMR Supreme Council building for the meeting with the President.

During a brief speech, the President mentioned the most important moments of contemporary political and economic life of the republic. Overtaking questions of numerous journalists, Igor Smirnov emphasized the negotiation process and specific of the current political moment, both inside the state and in affairs with foreign countries.

“The current year was characterized by international situation, which was considerably differing from what had been few years before. Let’s mark some moments. Firstly, it’s the on-going full-scale blockade of Dniestria, in all domains: political, social, economic; in all spheres of living activity, which influence this or that way upon life of the Dniestrian people. Just mind that we have lost about $ 100 million in the turnover. Contacts with many our economic partners were broken. I don’t know if Moldova got richer of that. On that background we observed failure and then full refusal of Kishinev of the negotiation process.

Secondly, it’s the growing intensive attention of the great powers to issue of normalizing relationship between the Republic of Moldova and the Dniester Moldavian Republic. This interest found its reflection also in the joint declaration on new strategic relations of the Russian Federation and Unites States of America. This attention is not a simple curiosity. Observing integration processes not only in the European but also in world scale, we see that the world is anxious with the factor of stability and prevention of repetition of any manifestations which might violate the external international boundaries from the international community point of view.

The third difference. It’s the activity of mediators of the negotiation process on background of full refusal by the Republic of Moldova to continue the negotiations, as I’ve already said. There is confirmation of that is non-participation of the Moldavian side in Bratislava meeting of experts and mediators for restarting of direct negotiations within frames of the quanta-lateral format, the result of which was establishment of the Permanent convention on political issues and holding of its participants’ meeting in Kiev in July 2002.

The above-mentioned factors are manifested on background of cardinal transformations in the Europe and world, where on borders of the ages, the international community has widely extended the existing frames of settling conflicts. We became witnesses of recent international recognition of the state – Serbia and Montenegro. And in my opinion, it’s important that long-time problems in the post-Soviet space should be resolved by applying a new progressive model, that is, the model of interstate association.

We consider it as a perspective way of overcoming controversies, and joining not only Moldova but also a number of conflict zones to All-European and world integration processes.

I’d like to remark that authority of Dniestria has a monolith and time spirit assonant concept of settlement, taking into account the present reality. We brought it to the notice of the mediators, and it was officially handed to the Moldavian side in February 2002. I’d like you to mind that the Republic of Moldova has no such a concept yet, though the negotiations have been under way since 1994, and three presidents have been already changed”.

The DMR highly appreciated the Kiev meeting, the new approach towards the problem of settlement having been its result. Refusal of unitary state structure of Moldova was officially offered for the first time. In opinion of Igor Smirnov, confirmation of the quanta-lateral format of the negotiations, and obligation of the parties to fulfill agreements achieved before, was also the positive moment of that meeting. It is also important that the parties agreed not to put forward any conditions impeding the negotiation process.

Grown interest of the world community towards the fate of Dniestria and the negotiation process in general was called the next specific moment. Enlarged circle of political and business visits, with which international organizations, political benefactors, commercial directors of companies and enterprises arrive to our republic, testifies that. “Despite the fact that we have neither oil, nor gas, nor other natural resources, our economic potential attracts attention of international investors”, underlined the DMR President.

Having mentioned economic questions, Igor Smirnov said that somehow the blockade somehow has not only minuses but also pluses. By his words, in these conditions we managed to make sure how independent and strong we were in economic domain. Having incurred losses in industry, we however managed to cope with the situation. The losses consisted less than 25% in comparison with the last year level. The GDP has reduced for 13%. Though it negatively influenced upon life of the Dniestrian society, it did not ruin and totally paralyzed the economic mechanism. Besides, as the DMR President assured, the existing debts in pensions and wages would have been fully paid off by the end of this year. “After all, stability, including political one, first of all begins with stable economy, and we have it, we may be even proud of it”, the President said. He also emphasized that despite the blockade, for the last year, the population’s incomes have increased for 24% in account of developing the internal sector, including business activity.

Having mentioned interactions of Moldova and Dniestria, the DMR President remarked, “We may talk only about association of states and building relationship on conventional basis”.

And generally, as Igor Smirnov said, “Fairness but not treaties reconcile peoples”. When a state pretends for property and territory of another one, but looks for mutually advantageous co-operation, only then fairness triumphs.

The President’s report paid particular attention to the topic of relations between Dniestria and Russia. By words of Igor Smirnov, we were interested in presence of Russia in this region but the RF was leaving Dniestria, accomplishing decision of Istanbul summit. Withdrawal of weaponry was provisionally stopped until the Russian side (more exactly – the RF Ministry of defense) fulfilled duties taken upon it regarding compensation to Dniestria for the withdrawn weaponry, as fixed by Odessa agreements.

And here is a one more feature to the existing situation. As the DMR President informed, in the 12^th year of its existence, Dniestria finished establishment of the state’s legal basis. The Supreme Council adopted new laws, including the new Civil Code, the Land Code, and the Land Code. The Constitutional court is established.

Then the President of the Dniester Moldavian Republic answered the journalists’ questions. As expected, they were quite traditional and mainly concerned the problems of settling the Moldavian-Dniestrian relationship. For example, both the Moldavian and Dniestrian journalists were interested in attitude of the head of the state towards the new draft agreement on settlement offered in Kiev. The questions were asked from different positions, but everyone was worried about how that document had been admitted to accomplishment, whether it was generally acceptable or not. The President answered that the Dniestrian side was ready for co-operation and work on every document offered by the guarantor-countries. But beside official documents signed by concrete politicians, there are also anonymous projects. Even if we did not take them as basic ones in our work, we however get acquainted with them and study them. As known, each opinion has the right for existence but as for taking it into account, it is quite another story.

Igor Smirnov also informed the journalists that the result of recent meetings of the parties’ and mediators plenipotentiary representatives, which had taken place in Kishinev, was signing of protocols on August 28^th and 29^th, where it was foreseen to keep on working on all available draft agreements for the Dniestrian settlement. And there is the Russian Federation project (known as the project of Primakov), and the Ukrainian one (initiative of Leonid Kuchma), and of the OSCE, and of Dniestria, and including the project offered in July 2002 in Kiev.

There were many questions asked about debts of Moldova and Russia to Dniestria. As the President remarked, the debt of Moldova to Dniestria for electric engineering consists $27 million.

Russia withdrew weaponry from Dniestria for the sum of $1 100 million. Add here also the debt for facility services, making up $4,5 million. But the President found incorrect to say the total sum of the Russian debt, and to mention this topic in detail, considering delicacy of the topic.

The Russian journalists – correspondents of the newspapers “Vremia Novostey” (The News’ Time) and “Rossiyskaia Gazeta” (The Russian Newspaper) – were interested in the following: in opinion of the DMR President, who was more active in the negotiation process: the guarantor-countries or the USA. They got the answer that the guarantors were expressing activity. They needed stability in the region, and they applied all efforts for its preserving. Being echo of the recently sensational Russian press campaign that “Dniestria turned back from Russia”, a question was asked, if Dniestria was denying the pro-Russian vector in its policy. Igor Smirnov answered, “No, it does not deny it. It is namely Russia, which denies us. Russia is withdrawing its troops. Russia introduced the 20% value added tax for our commodities and removes us from its market. But we need the Russian market much. We however understand that no one is waiting for us in the West, that we first of all need each other here, both as economic partners and as countries tied as relatives and by common history”. Besides, as Igor Smirnov added, at the recent meeting with Pavel Petrovski – the RF Ambassador in Moldova –the very issues of attracting Russian investments to our republic had been mentioned.

Questions about the US participation in the negotiation process were rather often asked. As Igor Smirnov remarked, the interests of Washington to our region consist in depriving Russia of military and political presence in Dniestria. And as for their transformation into participants of the negotiation process, it depended on their willingness, as well as on position of all participants of the negotiation process. The President remarked, “We are ready to co-operate with all states. The main thing is that our interests should be protected”.

M.Semionova. August 31^st 2002.