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Moldovan president plans to discuss bilateral relations with Putin at CIS summit

Peresident Dodon has also hailed sustainable growth in trade between the two countries in the recent months

CHISINAU, September 26. /TASS/. Moldovan President Igor Dodon said on Tuesday he hopes to discuss bilateral relations with Russia at his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin due to take place in the Black Sea resort city of Sochi on October 11.

"My program has a working meeting with Putin in Sochi on October 11. The city will host a meeting of the Council of CIS Heads of State. We will discuss the bilateral agenda, including the recent developments between our countries," he said in an interview with Free Europe television and radio company.

At a meeting with Russian Ambassador to Chisinau Farit Mukhametship earlier on Tuesday, Dodon hailed sustainable growth in trade between the two countries in the recent months. He also thanked the Russian authorities for the amnesty covering tens of thousands of Moldovan labor migrants who had previously violated Russia’s migration laws. Earlier, he said he planned to ask the Russian authorities to carry out an additional amnesty for those of Moldovan labor migrants who has failed to obtain a legal status.

Despite these steps, Moldova’s government, which is in opposition to the president, expelled five Russian diplomats in May and declared Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, who is co-chair of the intergovernmental economic cooperation commission and Russian president’s envoy for the Transnistrian settlement, a persona non grata in August.

President Dodon placed responsibility for these actions on the ruling Democratic Party of Moldova and its "Western patrons" who are worried over the positive dynamics in Chisinau’s relations with Moscow.