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Transnistria and Other Matters
First, let me open this with a developing humanitarian crisis that, incidentally, was expected. Their gas supplies come from Russia. This rump statelet decided to become independent from Moldova in the 1990s, so they went to the Boris Yeltsin years. It was a choice. They wanted to remain part of a mythical USSR that no longer exists.
Here is a little of the history. As usual, I recommend reading the full post to understand some of this, even at a bare-bones level. And no, I do not claim any expertise. Also, this conflict precedes the Vladimir Putin era. However, it might come to a messy end:
Since the 1920s, the Soviet Union had used regional autonomy to foster and protect linguistic and cultural autonomy. The Transnistrian push for autonomy, then, was a continuation of this old Soviet idea.
After a series of referendums, the multicultural populace unilaterally established the Pridnestrovian Moldovan Soviet Socialist Republic within the USSR on September 2, 1990. Once it had become clear that the Soviet Union was careening toward collapse after the failed August coup against Mikhail Gorbachev, the government in Tiraspol declared the creation of the modern PMR on August 25, 1991.
By March 1992, the political dispute between Tiraspol and Chișinău escalated into open warfare. In June the Russian 14th Army, which had…