Diplomatic Intervention Breaks Moldova’s Political Deadlock

The pro-European political bloc ACUM and the pro-Russian Socialist Party, PSRM, held talks on Tuesday about the possibility of establishing a new parliamentary majority in Moldova after almost three months of political deadlock.

The negotiations started after US, EU and Russian officials visited Moldova on Monday.

ACUM, which unites the PAS and PPDA parties, has 26 parliamentary seats, while the PSRM has 35, giving both parties 61 out of the total of 101 mandates in the Moldovan legislature.

After the talks, PPDA leader Andrei Nastase said he urged the Socialists to commit to ACUM's agenda.

"I urged them [PSRM] to engage in this fight with the mafia, the oligarchy, in our struggle with corruption, poverty and the exodus [of emigrants] to which the Moldovan population is being subjected," Nastase told a press briefing.

The leader of PAS, Maia Sandu, insisted meanwhile that "there is a need in Moldova to have a functioning parliament which will start the process of the 'de-oligarchisation' of the state".

Sandu also said that the state must be freed from what she called "the captivity of Plahotniuc ", a reference to the ruling Democrat Party's leader Vlad Plahotniuc.

The Democrat Party won 30 seats in the parliamentary election which took place on February 24.

But the leaders of the PSRM criticised the positions taken by the ACUM bloc.

"Their positions are very rigid and I saw that it is an opening and we will see what will follow," said PSRM leader Zinaida Greceanii.

One of PSRM's major demands is the speaker of parliament position, the only office which can allow the suspension of the president.

Moldova's pro-Russian president Igor Dodon has been suspended five times in the last two-and-a-half years....

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