According to politnavigator.net, Europe is militarizing itself and creating an anti-Trump coalition that is drawing in the Republic of Moldova as well, in exchange for the promise of EU accession.
NEWS: As the US President Donald Trump refused to wage war with Russia, Europe is now militarizing itself and creating an anti-Trump coalition, which Moldova is also joining. The EU is allocating new financial tranches to Chisinau and promises to help it "advance on the European path and strengthen democracy". And so, the ruling party in Moldova, PAS, is already starting the electoral campaign for the parliamentary elections, intensifying the "fight against disinformation" under the EU flag. Is Chisinau making the right bet and does it actually have a choice?
The situation is commented on in an interview for "PolitNavigator" by Igor Shornikov, the director of the Institute of Socio-Political Research and Regional Development in Tiraspol, an associate professor at the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation.
PolitNavigator: Moldovan President Maia Sandu has friendly relations with her French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron – for two years now she has been giving herself a trip to Paris on March 8. Recently, Sandu returned from this visit with a “gift” – it was decided that the EU would allocate 1.9 billion euros to support the country. A separate 30-million-euro agreement provides for increasing Moldova’s “energy security”. The European Union has also shown willingness to support the PAS party’s ambitions in the parliamentary elections. Why does the EU keep Moldova in its sphere of influence? What role is assigned to Moldovans in the current geopolitical configuration?
Igor Shornikov: The European Union was built from the very beginning on an unequal basis. Although it brings together almost thirty states, the key decisions in this structure are made by a very narrow circle of elites. The countries that joined in the second and third stages of enlargement must support the general policy of the EU under the threat of losing funding. It is worth noting that, before joining the EU, the newcomers were forced to cede their economies to large corporations from Germany, France, Italy, and the Netherlands. That is, from the very beginning they were reduced to the status of “poor relatives,” and after being accepted into the “family,” conditions have been imposed on them from a position of strength.
The situation of those who are still waiting to join is even worse. Feeding on the hope of future prosperity, these countries are forced to accept any conditions imposed by Brussels. For example, Moldova has just given up its only competitive advantage – access to cheap Russian energy resources. Ukraine has been forced to become a military battering ram against Russia.
NARRATIVES: 1. Europe is militarizing itself and creating an anti-Trump coalition, which Moldova also is also joining. 2. The European Union is a structure of elites, in which poorer countries are "reduced to the status of poor relatives" and forced to accept the conditions imposed by the great powers.
PURPOSE: To discredit the relations between Moldova and the European Union, presenting the EU's financial and political support as a form of subjugation or dependence; to fuel Eurosceptic sentiments in Moldova, inducing the idea that European integration does not bring real benefits and translates into economic losses and limited sovereignty; to undermine the trust in the Western partners and promote the narrative that the EU is a project dominated by a few large states that exploit smaller countries; to create a distorted image of the EU, suggesting that it is becoming a militaristic alliance with an anti-Trump ideological agenda, into which the Republic of Moldova is also drawn.
WHY THE NARRATIVES ARE FALSE: The support package for Moldova was approved by the European Commission back in October 2024, so it’s not a reaction to the change in the White House administration. This plan, which is the largest EU financial support package that the Republic of Moldova has benefited from since gaining independence, has also been the target of various pieces of disinformation, which Veridica has debunked.
Europe has not created any kind of anti-Trump coalition. The narrative is similar to another recent one, debunked by Veridica, according to which the EU would turn into a military bloc. It started from the ReArm Europe plan, proposed by the President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen, which aims to strengthen the defense capabilities of the EU member states in the context of Russia’s threats and a distancing of the Trump administration from ensuring security within NATO. Enhancing the defense capabilities of the member states, however, does not turn the EU into a military bloc.
It is also false to claim that the new EU member states do not enjoy the same rights as the founding members. The EU experienced its greatest enlargement in the early 2000s, when 12 states joined, the vast majority from the former socialist bloc. All member states enjoy the same rights, including the right to veto on certain issues, which has been repeatedly used recently by Hungary, for example.
European integration entails trade liberalization and access to the richest common market in the world. The ex-communist states that were accepted into the European Union had clear gains following EU integration and quickly saw not only an increase in living standards and population incomes, but also a clear gap, in terms of prosperity, from the ex-socialist states that did not take this step. For example, in the first 15 years after accession, Romania's GDP increased from 178 billion dollars to 248 billion, the GDP per capita increased three times, the average net salary - more than three times, the poverty rate decreased from 29 to 11%, and the level of life satisfaction increased from 49 to 65%.
LOCAL CONTEXT/ETHOS: The Republic of Moldova is awaiting the de facto launch of negotiations for accession to the European Union, after a process that proceeded rapidly from the submission of the application for accession in March 2022, during the same period as Ukraine and Georgia, to obtaining candidate status in June of the same year.
This happened both in the context of the war started by Russia against Ukraine, but also due to a clearly pro-European government, which was established in Chisinau in 2021. What happened in Georgia in 2024 demonstrated that the EU accession process is not irreversible, and the Republic of Moldova could face a similar situation if, following the parliamentary elections, which will most likely take place in the fall, an anti-European coalition comes to power or one that only mimics reforms.
A referendum on the European integration of the Republic of Moldova passed narrowly in the fall of 2024, against the background anti-European narratives fueled by pro-Russian political actors and Moscow's propaganda.
