CHISINAU, June 28. /TASS/. The deputy speaker of the Moldovan parliament, Vlad Batrincea, has called the authorities' decision to start withdrawing from the Interparliamentary Assembly of the CIS member states as extremely short-sighted.

"This is an extremely short-sighted decision. Cooperation within the CIS opens up opportunities in relations not only with Russia, but also with Kazakhstan, Belarus, Armenia, Azerbaijan and other CIS countries, to which we have increased our exports even during the current crisis in Ukraine. The CIS market opens opportunities for dozens of Moldovan companies, but our authorities refuse to realize this," Batrincea said on the RLive TV channel. He also recalled that "at present 400 thousand citizens of Moldova are in Russia, from whom the current government in Chisinau has turned away."

Igor Grosu, the speaker of Parliament and leader of the Party of Action and Solidarity, announced that Moldova had started the process of leaving the CIS IPA. At the same time, he noted that the authorities approached selectively the denunciation of agreements with the CIS and intended to preserve those of them, which were beneficial to the country's economy.

Moldova’s attitude to the CIS began to change after the victory of Maia Sandu in the presidential elections in 2020. She has never participated in the CIS summits. This year Chisinau's rhetoric towards the Commonwealth has toughened: Foreign Minister Nicolae Popescu announced the beginning of denunciation of a number of agreements signed within the framework of the association. However, Economic Development and Digitalization Minister Dumitru Alaiba said that the republic should leave in force those of them that were useful for the economy. Agriculture and Food Industry Minister Vladimir Bolea agrees. He believes that the withdrawal from the CIS will be a blow to the country's key industry.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has described Chisinau's policy as duplicitous, noting that while stating their desire to leave the CIS the Moldovan authorities were in no hurry to waive the social and economic benefits of participation in the Commonwealth.

The Moldovan opposition is critical of this policy. The leader of the largest opposition Party of Socialists, former president Igor Dodon, believes that the country will not survive without close cooperation with the CIS, the Eurasian Economic Union and Russia. He points out that the current government’s polices have plunged the country into the worst crisis in recent years, as local agro-industrial exporters have lost their markets, while the prices of gas and other Russian energy resources have grown several-fold. In Dodon's opinion, this policy is being conducted on instructions from foreign circles and against the interests of Moldova.