President of Moldova Maja Sandu She stated that she would vote for reunification with Romania if the issue were ever put to a referendum, stating that it was becoming increasingly difficult for her country to "survive" independently.
With a population of around 2,4 million, located between Romania and Ukraine, Moldova has become a target of Russian hybrid warfare, including disinformation and manipulation of electoral processes, writes the Brussels-based portal "Politiko".
"If we had a referendum, I would vote for unification with Romania," Sandu, who leads the pro-European government in Chisinau, said on the British podcast "The Rest is Politics."
“Look at what’s happening around Moldova today. Look at what’s happening in the world,” she explained. “It’s becoming increasingly difficult for a small country like Moldova to survive as a democracy, as a sovereign state, and, of course, to resist Russia.”
Moldova was part of Romania from 1918 to 1940, when it was annexed by the Soviet Union, before declaring independence in 1991 after the fall of the “Iron Curtain”.
In a referendum held in 2024, a narrow majority of Moldovans - 50,4 percent - voted for membership in the European Union, in a vote marred by Russian interference. Sandu was re-elected president in parallel elections with about 55 percent of the vote, defeating her pro-Russian opponent.
Despite expressing personal support for the idea, Sandu added that she accepts the fact that reunification with Romania does not have majority support in Moldova - unlike EU accession, which the country applied for in 2022 and which she called a "more realistic goal."
Public opinion polls show that around two-thirds of Moldovans oppose unification, while support for the idea is traditionally higher in Romania.
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