Moldovan president's visit to Kiev unfreeze Moldovan-Ukrainian relations

Chisinau, 13 January /MOLDPRES/ - There has been an absolute winter in the relations between Ukraine and Moldova in the last three years; a freezing of the good-neighbour processes. And Moldova was no exception. Along with Cuba, Venezuela, North Korea, Moldova, through statements by some politicians, openly expressed its approval for the annexation of the peninsula Crimea by Russia. Or, Ukraine cannot have normal relations with the states which approve the violation of the country’s territorial sovereignty and the international agreements on borders. Let us not forget also the Budapest Memorandum, under which the great powers, including Russia, guaranteed the territorial integrity of Ukraine in exchange for Kiev’s refusal to hold nuclear weapons.     
President Maia Sandu has never recognized the annexation of Crimea and this gave her occasion to re-bring the relations between the two neighbours to normal. Moreover, international commentators stressed the perfect synchronization of the positions of Kiev and Chisinau in the most delicate political, economic and ecological problems, discussed at the bilateral meetings.    
It was only natural for the political problems to dominate the agenda of the meetings between the two heads of state, for mere reason that most of them are common for both sides. The officials showed mutual support in efforts as to ensuring the territorial integrity of the states, European integration, joint accession to the Three Seas Initiative, promoting the initiative EU Plus Three (this means three associated countries and with strong European aspirations: Moldova, Ukraine and Georgia), withdrawal of the Russian troops and ammunitions from Moldova’s eastern districts. The last issues are extremely complicated and during almost those three decades, none of the governors has been able to solve them. This could have happened, only if Vladimir Voronin signed the Kozak Plan, which was equivalent to the voluntary ceding of Moldova’s territorial sovereignty and even independence.     
The project on edification of a common road corridor Kiev-Yampil-Soroca-Chisinau is of strategic and economic importance and is in the interest of both countries’ citizens.  
„One of the projects discussed is the development of infrastructure through the creation of a road transport corridor between Chisinau and Kiev, which would be the quickest way between the two states’ capitals. We analyzed the option of developing the road infrastructure on the route Chisinau-Soroca-Yampil-Kiev. We have more common problems to be solved and we are sure that the today’s meeting lays the foundations of a strategic long-term cooperation between our states,’’ Maia Sandu said in Kiev.   
It is obvious that also the crossing of the Moldovan-Ukrainian border based on the identity card and the tacking of the delicate problem of protection of the Dniester river will have a continuation in the commissions set up on this occasion. The issues concerning the economic relations had an ambitious agenda too. The energy security, Ukraine’s willingness to provide its own reservoirs for stocking gas, boosting the trade… were discussed on principle, with the first steps due to be undertaken in the near future. While presently, as international expert Anton Kuciuhidze reported for the Voice of America, the commercial exchanges between the countries stand at 896 million dollars annually, this goal can be overcome with the removal of the artificial obstacles inherited from the past. And, not less important is the issue of legal properties of Moldova on the territory of Ukraine – a subject on which Maia Sandu insisted.   
Will these far-reaching and extremely promising initiatives have finality of not? It is hard to answer univocally, taking into account the crises faced by the world and the processes of reconfiguring of the civilizational borders. The director of the Ukrainian Fund Democratic Initiatives, Aleksey Garani, said that the wish of cooperation between the two countries can be jeopardized by three factors: Russia’s position, the result of the snap parliamentary elections and the condition of parliamentary republic. Nevertheless, the last two impediments can disappear, given that if the pro-European side wins in the snap parliamentary elections, Maia Sandu has full capacity to implement the things set at the Kiev meeting.    
photo: prm