Moldova’s pro-European President, Maia Sandu, said Russia’s Wagner paramilitary force was the sole force which was doing efforts to foment a coup in opposition to her, she told the Financial Times in an interview printed on Friday. Sandu, interviewed by the Financial Times during the European Union’s European Political Community summit in Spain, said Wagner’s late governer Yevgeny Prigozhin landed behind the bid to overthrow her.
She also said Moscow went on to stay engrossed in efforts to destabilise the nation lying between Ukraine and EU member Romania, specifically by splurging money into Moldova to bribe voters in next month’s local elections. “The data that we have is that it was a plan created by (Prigozhin’s) team,” Sandu told the FT in reference to the alleged coup, adding that the group was attempting to get anti-government protests, done periodically since previous year, to turn violent.
“The situation is really difficult to handle and we have the responsibility to save ourselves.” Sandu threw Russia in February of plotting a coup in opposition to Moldova’s government by misusing protests. Russia’s foreign ministry has denied clearly such claims and in past thrown allegations on Moldova for having an anti-Russian goal. She and other governers show gestures towards immense pressure on the nation, specifically because of pricing and payment for Russian energy supplies.
Moscow also exerts impact through a pro-Russian separatist enclave, Transdniestria, in Moldova’s east. Since Sandu’s 2020 election, Moldova has denounced Russia’s war in Ukraine and become a candidate for EU membership. Prigozhin, whose mercenaries gave a lot of efforts in capturing parts of eastern Ukraine for Russia in the last year, staged a small mutiny against Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin in June. He lost his life in plane crash two months later.
“Russia will be making attempts to raise its pressure on Moldova,” Sandu conveyed the FT. “They attempted energy and they were not able to succeed. They attempted to overthrow the government and they could not successfully execute their plan. And currently they are attempting immense unnecessary involvement in our elections, with their utilisation of a lot of money.”