MOSCOW, November 12 /TASS/. A pause in negotiations on the Trans-Dniester settlement should not be long. It is necessary to adopt a work schedule for 2015, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Wednesday.
The Trans-Dniester settlement dominated a meeting between Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin and Radojko Bogojevic, the special envoy of the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office for the Trans-Dniester settlement, held earlier on Wednesday.
“The sides discussed the state and prospects for the Trans-Dniester settlement as well as the guidelines for the OSCE activities on the Trans-Dniester track in 2015,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said.
“The Russian side noted that Chisinau’s policy of initiating criminal proceedings against the officials of Trans-Dniester region is not creating a positive background for negotiations. This is also true of a Moldovan parliament law which is currently being in the making and which proclaims the majority of the population on the left-bank of the Dniester River to be violators of Moldovan laws in legal terms or ‘separatists’,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said adding that all this looked provocative under the current circumstances.
A long pause in the “5+2” negotiations /Moldova and Trans-Dniester region as the sides in conflict; the OSCE as an intermediary; Russia and Ukraine as guarantor countries and brokers as well as observers from the European Union and the United States/ is also dangerous, according to the Ministry.
International brokers exerted a great deal of effort to make the negotiations resume in 2011 after a six-year break. The sides stressed the need to work out a work schedule for 2015.
It was noted that the 1997 Memorandum which Chisinau and Tiraspol as well as the guarantor states signed in the presence of the incumbent OSCE chairperson-in-office should remain a vital instrument in the solution of many issues that are a source of concern for the parties in conflict.
“The document’s resource has not been exhausted,” the Russian Foreign Ministry added.
“Russia, as a broker and guarantor of the Trans-Dniester settlement, hopes that the negotiating parties will show a constructive approach to the solution of urgent problems on the agenda and expects the Moldovan side to resume its active participation in the work of two expert /working/ groups and regular contacts between political representatives of Chisinau and Tiraspol after the elections in Moldova scheduled for November 30,” the Russian Foreign Ministry stressed.