Moldovans

Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky told Romanian lawmakers on Monday evening that Kyiv will seek a new agreement with Bucharest to resolve mutual problems and bring the two states closer together after the war.

Authorities plan incentives to lure talented young Moldovans back to the country, but some migration experts doubt they will achieve much.

With help from Egypt and Ukraine, Moldovan authorities evacuated 13 Moldovan citizens, including children, from the Gaza Strip, who arrived back on Thursday following the recent military conflict between Hamas and Israeli forces, which destroyed much of the Gaza Strip.

One out of every four Moldavans now has Romanian citizenship, and the proportion could rise by the end of 2021 to a third of the total population, according to official statistics.

The number of Moldovans with Romanian citizenship has increased steadily over the last 20 years, and has reached 642,149 people out of a total of 2.7 million inhabitants.

Moldovan citizens returning home on charter flights organized by the authorities are now obliged - together with the cost of the ticket - to pay for a COVID-19 test on arrival under an order issued on Friday by the Moldovan Civil Aviation Authority.

Seeking re-election, Igor Dodon is fanning the flames of dispute over the language Moldovans speak.

The anti-terrorism division of the Moldovan Secret Services, SIS, and the Border Police announced on Monday that they have detained a 28-year-old citizen of Tajikistan who is wanted internationally for his alleged affiliation with militant group Islamic State.

The Tajik citizen was caught while seeking to leave Moldova using a fake Ukrainian passport.

Support for NATO membership is declining among Moldovans, to the benefit of the co-ruling Socialists.

A new survey conducted by the Institute for Public Policy in Moldova, IPP, shows that half of all Moldovan citizens would leave the country if they had the chance to do so, mostly due to poverty, corruption and lack of a perspective.

A Romanian police raid on Thursday revealed that thousands of Moldovans have paid for fake addresses to get citizenship of EU-member Romania and an official residence in Bucharest.