 Well good afternoon everybody thank you so much for coming. Thank you Bill for the warm introduction and thank you to our distinguished guests from the Parliament of Moldova and of course Ambassador Ursu. As Bill said I'm Jordan Andrews I'm here with the Center for Russian Europe and it's our pleasure to have this our first inaugural Moldova event for a new effort that we are undertaking on Moldova. I'd like to offer just a few brief remarks that's at the stage for our panel discussion and then I will introduce Ambassador Ursu to give some some remarks up the top and then after that we'll have a conversation with our two distinguished guests Mihai Pupshoi who's Deputy Speaker of the Parliament of Moldova and of course Ambassador Bill Hill a global fellow at the Wilson Center and a former U.S. diplomat who twice has served as the head of the OSCE mission in Moldova. Today's discussion on Russia's malign influence in Moldova is both important and extremely timely for a number of reasons. First we all recall that one of Russia's aims when it launched its war in Ukraine was to establish a land corridor all the way across southern Ukraine and eventually to get to Transnistria in Moldova. Just a few days ago on November 30th I think most of us heard Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov who said and I quote Moldova is actually in the process of preparing to become the next victim of the hybrid war that the West has unleashed against Russia. If that's not a clear threat I don't know what is. And then just yesterday U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken hosted Romanian Prime Minister Marcello Celaccio here in Washington and in his public remarks to the media before the meeting Prime Minister Celaccio urged Secretary Blinken to quote take into consideration a special relationship with the Republic of Moldova. It's the most vulnerable country the second most vulnerable country after Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova is subjected to hybrid warfare directed against the president Maya Sandu and against democratically elected government. So let's think about that for a moment. The leader of a NATO ally and a EU member state used nearly half of his public remarks with the U.S. Secretary of State to urge that the United States maintain a special relationship with Moldova to help protect it from Russian malign influence. As I said before today's discussion is both timely and important. In so many ways Moldova's story is very inspiring. Here in America we have a famous children's story called the little engine that could. It's about a small but courageous and intrepid train engine who overcomes great obstacles to climb a big mountain and reach his goals. Moldova is a lot like that little engine that could. Since its independence Moldova has faced daunting obstacles including to cite just a few examples a 30 year frozen conflict in Transnistria sparked by Russian back separatists. A Russia fueled money laundering scheme that led to the theft of one billion dollars which at the time was a significant portion of Moldova's GDP. State capture for a period of time by a single oligarch and a legacy of undue influence by other oligarchs. The near complete saturation of the information space by Russian media and propaganda institutions, near complete energy dependence on Russia and finally Russia's heavy interference in Moldova's elections and governance through financial and other support to certain Moscow friendly political parties politicians and oligarchs. But just like that little engine that could Moldova seems determined to overcome these obstacles and reach its declared destination which is full membership in the community of European democracies and free markets and never before has Moldova's compass remained so fixed on its European future. Since President Sandu was inaugurated in 2021 her government has survived a Russia backed plot to overthrow it, battled the flood of Russian disinformation and survived the public protests that resulted, has largely diversified its energy demand away from Russian sources, has accepted the highest per capita number of Ukrainian war refugees and implemented reforms that were sufficient to earn a positive recommendation for opening EU accession talks. Clearly Russia is working harder than ever to destabilize Moldova and divert it from its European trajectory. Now perhaps more than ever Moldova needs steadfast partners. In that spirit it's my pleasure to introduce Mr. Viorel Ursu, Ambassador of the Republic of Moldova to the United States to deliver remarks on Russia's malign influence and how the United States can further augment Moldova's efforts to build resilience. Ambassador Ursu is a dedicated transatlantic scholar and statement statesman he has worked and studied in the United Kingdom, Belgium, Poland, Switzerland, France, Spain and a little known university here in the United States called Harvard. With two master's degrees in EU law it's quite possible that the ambassador knows more about the EU than the EU itself. So Mr. Ambassador thank you again for being here and the microphone is yours. Thank you and thank you for the Institute of Peace for organizing this event for us. I think it's probably one of the it's not the first event on Moldova in this institution I hope not the last one. As I said when we were framing this conversation I is just because of my background as I used to work in Brussels on previous enlargement of the European Union. I'm a big believer in European Union as a peace project. I wanted to talk about Moldova's own step trajectory now to the European Union and the I hope it's going to be a historical decision just in 10 days in Brussels 15th of December when we we hope the EU leaders coming together will will agree to opening the negotiations for accession for the Republic of Moldova. I think that's the highlight of our foreign policy that's the focus of foreign policy but also is the vision that the President Sando had and that would guide the transformation modernization of Moldova for the next seven ten years and hopefully will become the member of the EU. However when I when I came to DC a year ago I had very different concerns and one of my the main two tasks that I had coming into this mission at that time that was before we were getting into the winter last year was I had two tasks one is to make sure that the US as much as the other partners in Europe continue supporting Ukraine to defend itself because it's also defending Moldova. We are the closest to the front line and at that time and even now every morning the first thing I do is opening the news the Ukrainian news watching the front line and the second task was again is seeking the help of our partners including on the EU from the US on how we can mitigate the Russian hybrid attacks that already we were seeing were intensifying especially over the last autumn. Just going back a year ago I think the Russian plan that we know much more now about that was a very simple one is using the weaponizing the energy. Moldova really had that vulnerability that we were a hundred percent dependent on Russian supply of mostly gas but also electricity which is produced from burning the Russian gas and Russian never hesitated to use that leverage you know previously to use it use it trade embargo as a way to leverage but that was really one of the most difficult to overcome just because we use the Russian gas to hit our mostly private and public buildings. So I arrived in September in October already Russia cut the gas supply by 30 percent and then first of December they cut by another 50 percent. Moldova is not a big consumer of energy still between Transnistrian region and the rest of Moldova we actually divided half and half of the consumption so when Russia cut by 50 percent we had a choice the government had a choice either to continue sharing that volume of gas or it was actually a much bolder decision I think politically that the government decided they're not going to buy anymore of Russian gas and all the supplies that continue would go only for the consumption of Transnistrian region. That meant that we really had to to find solution to find new supplies in a very short time. None of the governments in the 30 years of independence in Moldova actually ever addressed that issue of vulnerability and just in few weeks just in few weeks at that time I think Moldovan government again with the support of our partners including the US European partners as well were able to secure a new supply of gas from Europe. Russian plan was easy you you cut the gas supply you which forces Moldovan to go to buy on European market it just happened that it was seven times more expensive because everybody was struggling to find new sources of gas because we have market economy it means that the final consumers will have to pay their energy bills for heating at seven fold increase that created an inflation of 35% last year and there was genuine people struggling and there are more vulnerable population than ever that struggled even to pay the bills. As a result we saw public protests including on the street again the government some of them or most of them probably were genuine because really people were struggling and again the Russian plan was to use that protest and infiltrate some of the violent elements among the protest well trained abroad that will little filtrate and then provoke violence over overreaction from the police. There was a plan from the spring and I think that was we we found many of those details by the way on the round of US sanctions that were announced the second round was announced last June against some of the Russian agents who were involved in training some of those protest elements. I want to say without going into much details that Russian plan failed I think on the again what really helped us is that many of our partners primary European but also the US supported us from those difficult moments. I keep repeating that the the friends they need are friends indeed and we really saw who our real friends are including from the US it unprecedented when the when the administration but the Congress adopted a substantial support for Moldova about 300 million just to secure our energy to provide support for our energy security. Some of the money including the European helped us to compensate some of the costs the rising costs for the most vulnerable consumers but also help us to look into future and reshape our gas grid and also electricity grid and to prepare us to be much more independent in our future energy production and supply. Russian failing on on on this scenario of course doesn't give up and we see continuous efforts to try to change and to influence both politics but also the population in Moldova and there are many ramifications of that most recently we had elections local elections we saw a lot of illegal money funding going to various new political projects in Moldova energy remains again another weapon that Russia tries to to continue to use even in the elections we saw some promises of cheap gas supply coming from a very untransparent offshore companies most probably Russian sources to very specific region that would vote for Russian candidates and then most recently again trade embargo Russia just last week introduced again trade export embargo Moldovan fruits and vegetables which many of our farmers still rely on and of course this information and misinformation it's still very much of it is controlled by some of the Russian sources which of course is a much difficult to overcome especially for democracies including Moldova where you really have to balance on freedom of opinion expression freedom of speech and curtailing some of those disinformation sources that primary focuses on propagating hate especially towards Ukraine also I think this new reality is being also reflected in the updated national defense strategy which was sent to the which was announced the president sandoor a month ago and is now in the in the in the parliament and I hope my my colleague here deputy speaker of the parliament me high pop sure I can go into more details so I really wanted to share those which I I hope at least positive for me in one year seeing how the situation was a year ago and this winter for instance we are entering the winter it's much confident much much better prepared probably the best prepared into the winter because again with the support from the US Europeans we were actually able to buy gas when it's cheaper in the summer cheaper than what would have be the price from gas from if they actually continued the the the contract and we for the first time we actually have enough gas in our reserves to go for the winter so even the fluctuation of prices wouldn't affect so that required a really bold leadership of course it was very risky but as I said what doesn't kill you make you stronger and we always managed to get through some of those challenges and provocation by the Russia to to become stronger and I think this year we are definitely proved again with the support of our partners in the US Europeans that we can overcome some of those challenges thank you so ambassador thank you very much for those remarks the the explanation of the energy steps that Moldova has taken is is really hopeful and obviously energy was one of the main vectors of Russian malign influence so wow that's a lot of progress in one year but thank you for framing I think it's perfect for this discussion that we'll that we'll be having so now I'd like to introduce a little bit or two distinguished guests and then have a little bit of a discussion and I will do my utmost to save some time at the end for audience questions. Mihai Popchoi is deputy speaker of the Moldovan parliament and vice president and international secretary of the ruling action and solidarity party of Moldova as an expert in Moldova's political dynamics as well as regional security developments he previously conducted research with a number of us think tanks and institutions and worked for the NATO center in Moldova so thank you very much mr. speaker for taking time to be with us today ambassador bill hill in the far chair is a global fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center for scholars he's a retired foreign service officer and ambassador hill was twice appointed as head of the osc mission to Moldova where as I understand it according to his biography he was quote charged with negotiation of a political settlement to the transnistria conflict and facilitation of the withdrawal of Russian forces arms and ammunition from Moldova wow that's an that's a very ambitious mandate and bill I think I speak for all of us here and possibly for the entire country of Moldova when I say just how disappointed we are that you were unable to resolve the transnistria conflict in two tries and escort the Russians out of Moldova but I understand you're still working with Moldova and Moldovans and so there's still hope yet and but thank you also for being here and sharing this time with us ambassador hill of course remains one of the us the foremost us experts on Moldova both either inside or outside the government and of course esteemed former foreign service colleague and a good friend to both Moldova and this institute so thanks thanks again bill and now I'll open with one question for each of our panel members to get the conversation started and then we'll see where the conversation goes from there and speaker pop sure if I could begin with you and again welcome to us ip thank you for for being here during your visit my question is this we're all waiting hopefully and dare I say expectantly for the european council decision next week on accession talks for Moldova and ukraine in fact as I was mentioning backstage I'm even wearing my eu tie as a good luck charm hope hoping that the decision goes well um speaker what are some of the specific steps that Moldova is currently taking we already talked about energy but there are some other vectors for russian malign influence not least of which democratic interference disinformation corruption and even transnistria um perhaps speak to us a little bit about what what other things Moldova is doing to try to make itself more resilient in the face of russia's malign influence thank you and I really appreciate the opportunity of presenting you some of the successes that Moldova has achieved in the past two years and of course some of the challenges still remain when it comes to russia's malign influence as it was mentioned already as we speak Moldova is debating the new national security strategy which will hopefully be approved this week well it should be approved since we have an absolute majority in parliament uh it is a belated document in the sense that if you ask a proper security expert in Moldova and even anyone who follows the difficulties that Moldova has had in the past decades they would tell you which entity is the main national security threat to Moldova yet to this day this has not been reflected in Moldova's national strategic documents it is only this week we will be voting in a national security strategy of Moldova spelling out that russia is the main national security threat of Moldova and not only spelling it out but also making actions taking actions in order to build resilience in our institutions with that particular threat in mind unfortunately for far too long Moldovan politicians have not only avoided this truth but they've been actually actively engaging in promoting russia's malign influence in Moldova including and not limited to the propaganda which some of them politicians benefited directly from the broadcasting rights of russian tv stations in Moldova and of course the political parties that the russians have been sponsoring to do their bidding now that we've established clearly albeit a bit late that russia is a main national security threat we will have to invest more resources again something that we should have been doing all this 40 years 30 years but ironically it was also the the russians that have been inoculating this idea into the Moldovan public that security is a neutrality is a guarantee of security which is of course cannot be further from the truth no neutrality clause of any country has precluded an aggressor from taking advantage of the vulnerability of that country but the fact that the russians have promoted this idea that neutrality is a guarantee of security now it's very difficult to have this discussion about alternatives to Moldova security but we are opening this discussion and we are again spelling out in Moldova's national security document for the first time that we need to explore other avenues of ensuring Moldova's security not just limiting ourselves to neutrality and increasing our cooperation with NATO as again you don't have to have a phd in in security studies to realize that for a country like Moldova in the region that Moldova finds itself in such an alliance as NATO is the only guarantee of proper security but it will take time for us to to debate this in the public domain and to democratically engage with our citizens so that we break through this spell of Russian propaganda through this wall that has been built for 30 years that neutrality is a guarantee of security and to add insult to injury it is the the sheer fact that it was only Russia that was violating Moldova's neutrality for these 30 years maintaining unwanted military presence in Moldova and actually committing itself to withdrawing those military presence from under the 1990 99 OC summit in Istanbul and failing to do so up to to this day so Moldova is is clear in its in its stance now and will continue to support Ukraine because we realize that the suffering and the sacrifice of Ukraine it's not only for Ukraine's sake it also to keep us safe as well so we'll continue to provide our infrastructure and our our support and our openness of our homes to to our Ukrainian friends and neighbors and we are very thankful to the international community for helping Ukraine but also helping us and in this very difficult time when it comes to to Russia exploiting our vulnerability they they are now moving towards exploiting the democratic process against our democratic future they're trying to hijack our democratic elections in in their favor and that's why we had to take drastic measures to defend our democracy by the constitutional court declaring unconstitutional that party of shore the oligarch that is a fugitive from Moldovan justice and we'll continue to defend Moldovan democracy it doesn't give me any pleasure to be announcing that we had to to implement measures that preclude certain political parties from participating in the democratic process but then when these political parties have been actively engaging in corrupting our citizens and we've seen that time and time again including in the gaguzia election in the autonomous region just lately and even though i was sort of bragging at the beginning that we have 63 percent of seats in parliament and we have an absolute majority in parliament there is no way how i can compete or any other political force in Moldova can compete against cash i can tell Moldovan citizens that we are implementing robust reforms in combating corruption in building rule of law in strengthening Moldova security in embracing and and in implementing and defending human rights in Moldova but if somebody is offering that same citizen a hundred euros or a hundred dollars in cash unfortunately nine times out of ten and i might be optimistic here the people will take the money and that's why we had to take measures and thankfully our international partners and our citizens frankly understand that difficult times require difficult measures to be taken and we are thankful that the international community has supported us throughout this time to build our resilience in the energy sphere in our defense sector and i must commend our our minister of defense who have been so instrumental in doubling the Moldova's defense budget without necessarily using public resources just because of the openness and the generosity of our international partners he managed to double the budget but this year we also increasing increasing the defense budget because we need to to to play to invest our fair share as well and in this again national security strategy we are committed to increasing Moldova's budget in the upcoming years to one percent of GDP not quite there with the two percent of the NATO standard but then again the majority of NATO members are not quite fulfilling that standard for us one percent is a big is a big target because we've always had about point three percent point four percent so we are making serious steps in defending and and and increasing the resilience of our institutions and when it comes to the transition region of Moldova when it now that hopefully we will start negotiations with the EU this should be the biggest breakthrough the biggest opportunity also for the resolution of the conflict of the peaceful resolution of the conflict because the business elites in the transition region much like the rest of Moldova they see the benefits of being part of such a big market such a peaceful rule of law driven market as a european union and i'm very hopeful that the start of the negotiations will create this impetus that will kick start the process in a way that we unfortunately haven't seen for 30 years speak about sure could we return maybe to the media environment i know there have been legislative projects and steps taken to try to limit Russia's dominance a traditional dominance in Moldovan media and given the size of the media market there the model was not sufficient to generate a lot of new content from Moldova and so you were Moldova was was depending on Russia and elsewhere for for for free content essentially what steps has the parliament taken where where is that headed in in Moldova as i mentioned we've been in this very very odd situation when some of Moldova's politicians who pretended to be pro-european were rebroadcasting Russian propaganda in Moldova which was cannibalizing the advertisement market because you can imagine Russian federal TV channel with what a hundred million or more euros for entertainment budget being put in the same legal footing to compete on the national Moldovan market with the Moldovan TV channel which barely has a total budget of a million euros a year if at all that was an unlevel playing field and with the start of the Russian aggression in Ukraine and frankly even before that we were concerned but we were in opposition but when the Russian aggression started it took us a year and i'm not at all happy that it took us so long but we had to weigh all the pros and cons we're concerned about what our citizens are going to react while international partners are going to say because after all we are the biggest promoters of freedom of media and freedom of speech in Moldova and we didn't take this decision lightly but then when December came and it was a year into the Russian aggression in Ukraine the European Union shut down Russian propaganda in the EU Russia today and we figured if it's good for you to take these measures and it's about time that we take care of it as well so we shut down Russian federal TV channels in Moldova again very belated decision but we addressed that but it will take years for us to actually remedy the damage that has been done in these 30 years and also we need to invest more in quality content in Russian language in Moldova so that citizens who are Russian speakers have something to watch be it entertainment or news in the language that they understand proper quality content and we also have now a newly created institution a strategic communication unit that we modeled after our friends from the Baltics that will oversee the national media environment and social media to find and analyze and pinpoint where the narratives come from and where the attacks are coming to us and that the other proper institutions the national regulator and the audiovisual and the intelligence service so they can take action in due time and we've been proactive in defending our informational security a bit late but as they say better late than never and we're taking our information security a lot more serious and again we'll continue to invest in our security and information security and we need to provide those alternatives to our citizens and also in this national security strategy that's also an important element in building resilience in our institutions because we understand that when you live in Russian propaganda bubble when your citizens are left one-on-one with with with Russian propaganda that is inviting and creating the increasing the fertility of the ground for the Russians to exploit so we will address that thankfully but we'll take time as I mentioned to remedy the damage that is done and I have to thank American taxpayers and then USAID for supporting independent media in Moldova because without the support of the United States and European Union it would not be possible for for those few independent media in Moldova to be able now to compete and to win against the Russian elements that they are trying to to promote in Moldova. Thank you very much that's that's really useful interesting perspective on how far things have come but speaking speaking of how far things have come Ambassador Hill if I if I could turn to you help us with some perspective on on how far Moldova has come in building its resilience against Russian malign influence what in your view remains to be done I'm thinking particularly in the Transnistria space and how much things have changed there over the years and what can the US and other friends of Moldova do to to help Moldova as it as it builds up its resilience well thanks very much first of all for having me and I guess I'll start up with following the introduction you were the mea culpa indeed I didn't get it solved but I do you know if there's one thing did you accomplish anything in two terms as head of the OSCE mission when I arrived in Moldova in June of 1999 there were over 500 Russian tanks APCs and mobile artillery plus tons and tons thousands of trucks and other pieces of Russian military equipment in the Transnistria region and 40,000 metric tons that's metric tons not pounds of ammunition at Kolbasna all of the tanks APCs mobile artillery other military equipment and half of the ammunition are gone as Russian forces crossed the Dnipro through Kherson towards Mikhailov and the Ukrainians successfully resisted them imagine what might have happened had there been a second front from out of Transnistria into a Yesa oblast with that military equipment so it was 20 years later but it turns out actually there was something to what we did there we we for various other circumstances we didn't get done everything we wished to but this is emblematic of some of the changes four quick points and as what's the same and what's changed two things are really the same and Moldova is when the Soviet Union fell apart or when I was first there actually I was first there as detailed to the Department of Defense and OSD policy and visiting Moldova in the mid 90s as a DOD official the Russians still look at Moldova you know just Moldova Ukraine Belarus is their western perfect it's basically they admit it recognize them as independent but the Russians certainly I get this out of personal dealings they still consider that it's theirs it's it's and it's not just Soviet it's part of the Russian Empire Bessarabia first was annexed by Russia in 1812 and this this is an underlying attitude well independence okay as long as you vote the same way we do everywhere then you're perfectly independent to vote exactly as we tell you to either the the other thing in Moldova is that Moldova is a for a small country it is linguistically and ethnically complex with a number of minorities and in particular Deputy Speaker Pupshoi has referred to it that the extent of Russian language is broader than one might surmise if you just looked at the statistics for the last names of population whether you know ethnic Romanian Russian Ukrainian or whatever and it's it's it's been an ongoing problem because culturally the Russian speaking population for various reasons has been prone to getting influence from Russia you know and whether you know if it's some things if it's reading Pushkin or or watching the opera Boris Goodenoff it seems relatively harmless if it's other things as a Russian media environment and I lived in it it was a Russian media environment because of the strength of the Russian media as opposed to the Romanian language and that's been very hard to deal and it remains a problem which means that the the the avenue for Russian influence has been very stubborn and persistent what's changed well you know the Russians used to when I first came there the Russians used to penetrate get a lot of influence into Moldova through Transnistrian region 2014-2015 that changed as I one of my senior Moldovan friends said now Ukraine's on our side and the Russians don't get into Moldova through Ukraine and Transnistria and that's very important because it has led to a waning not an absence but a waning of the of the power of Russian influence through Transnistria the other thing over 30 years Russia or Transnistria has changed in that overtly Russian staffed and run institutions have receded a bit and local businesses and institutions that that are run by locals have become more influential and more determinative in how Transnistria looks at things it's not absolute the Russians still have people there they have influence there the FSB in particular is very well represented my estimation probably bigger danger right now than the uniform Russian military who were there but the Russians can't get to Moldova as much through Transnistria so they've been trying to get to them through energy I was working with the government when you know Kazat came down in 2021 made a you know it was really a nice offer to the Moldovans with a poison pill inside and when Yakishinau recognized the failings of the offer the Russians immediately resorted to energy present pressure and the other thing they have done is is the electoral influence you know I you know I can't do everything but you know they have come you know especially through the shore party just over you know trying to buy the electorate and the risk to Moldova here despite the progress that the current government has made taking advantage of opportunity moving really on the way I hope the hope the vote of the council will be good you know this month and I presume it will be because the signs are there but you know Moldova clearly has done very well in moving towards eventual EU membership and the candidacy process you know has its difficulties every kind of it's been through it knows that but I I see success here but politically the government is still vulnerable to Russian political you know Russian interference in the political process because of this portion of the electorate through poverty and through linguistic orientation still remains vulnerable to the media propaganda the political propaganda and the simply buying of votes and I don't have time to go into what they're doing but it really it's it's something where thankfully it looks like militarily thanks to what the Ukrainians have done the Russians militarily are not going to get to Moldova and thankfully Moldova and Ukraine the current government seemed very much on the same page supportive of each other proceeding together towards the EU it's in Moldova the Russians get there through an oligarch in refuge in Israel and this is the big danger now is that local elections just occurred the results were mixed inconclusive I would say pass didn't do as well as you wanted to it was not by no means a failure but it's clear that the political battles for the presidency in 2024 and the battle the parliamentary elections which must must come by mid 2025 are going to be you know require serious effort and I think my friend Mr. Popchoy has outlined the real problem is you know how do you deal with the political force that has strength in the country but does not accept the rules of the game does not accept basic democratic procedures principles in other words is is not going to play fair and is dedicated to restoring Russian influence and floating what seems to be a desire of a clear majority of the Moldovan population so that is what I see you know things have changed in the sense of how the Russians have been coming at Moldova and seeking to keep Moldova in their orbit but the basic problem really hasn't changed that much in in 30 years it's more acute now because the war next door but it it's not a dissimilar problem to what I first witnessed when I came there in the mid 1990s thank you very much bill we put a lot out there on the table we've talked about most of the major vectors of Russia's malign influence in Moldova I think this would be a great opportunity now we have a very Moldova supportive Moldova friendly audience we've got some real expertise in the audience so I would like to open the floor to audience members who would like to ask questions and we have a microphone back here Ellie I think we have someone up here oh yeah and there's here to cut okay thank you very much my name is Anna Seneva I'm here in a private capacity but I work for a religious organization and I'm a member of a religious minority that is currently under heavy crackdown and Russia like pretty much any religious minority I'm from Russia I'm a US citizen right now and I'm wondering I have a question for a mr. deputy speaker in your policies and in your plan in joining hopefully joining the EU what is your strategy on supporting civil society and particularly freedom of religion or belief because Russian government and the Russian Orthodox Church infamously infamously have been four decades bringing forward a strategy both inside the country and in the neighboring countries to divide and conquer to stigmatize minorities of any kind and with the with the objective of getting governments in other countries to crack down on any elements that aren't welcome in Russia either so just to crack down on any civil society journalists NGOs religious minorities and I think they've been very successful in a lot of countries so just wondering if you're you know aware of the strategy and what your plan is well I must say that I'm incredibly incredibly proud of our record when it comes to supporting and promoting minorities in Moldova all minorities we have in our faction in parliament ethnic minorities linguistic minorities religious minorities and we are proud of the diversity that we represent within our faction in parliament because in our effort to transform Moldova we need to make use of every single citizen's capacity to participate I am very proud to say that in the Republic of Moldova we have one of the best records in women empowerment we have 40 percent of women in in parliament thanks to the double quarter that we implemented and I have a suspicion that in the next election our list is going to be 50 50 and in this respect we try to be what Russia is not we're trying to be as European as we can be and we're trying to be as welcoming and accommodating to all our citizens no matter the differences that we have that has been a big credo and is a big credo of our present myosando and a big expectation of our citizens so we are incredibly open and we are incredibly supportive of civil society this year we're going to implement a funding to support also media in Moldova civil society and they are a reliable partner for us in our European aspirations so we are as open as we can be of course we can do better and we will do better thank you for that question let's go up here ambassador thank you I'm Pamela Smith and I was U.S. ambassador to Moldova some 20 years ago but it seems like yesterday in some ways it's wonderful to see so many people so interested in this wonderful country I was fascinated deputy speaker when you talked about the evolving attitude tornado in Moldova when I was there neutrality seemed like perhaps a way to keep Russia at bay maybe that's what Russians wanted Moldovans to think but anyway could you speak more please about the kind of relationship you foresee or wish to acquire with NATO thanks you're totally right in the 1994 constitution the neutrality clause was put there in the hope which is not a good strategy but nonetheless in the hope of shaming Russia in withdrawing its troops munitions from the republic of Moldova the clause of neutrality was put there in 1994 it is still there and the Russian troops are also there so that didn't help that was the primary idea behind neutrality clause there wasn't much of an evolution in our perception neutrality in the 30 years and when I was working for the NATO center in kishno 2008 2009 2010 I was hoping that there could be a change and went in 2014 after the annexation of Crimea there was an uptick in NATO support in Moldova it went from about traditional 25% it went about 35% and then in a couple of years it went back down to the traditional 25% and it was a shame because it was clear what the main threat in the region is and it was also clear what the main avenue to mitigate the threat is but because of Russian propaganda and quite frankly because of the political elites in Moldova were not proactive enough in advocating for NATO and discussing the alternatives to ensuring Moldova security we are stuck with the reality that we find ourselves in we now try to mitigate some of the damage and we are much more open in discussing the alternatives to neutrality but it needs to be a democratic process we need to we cannot impose a change of Moldova's security stance we need to persuade our voters that a democratic change and our closer relations with NATO are the proper way forward and we are committed to doing just that thank you another one back here thank you my name is Matthew Murray and I wanted to ask the deputy speaker if he could talk about what you've done to defend the banking sector the finance sector to create resiliency within you know the financial world to resist Russian money laundering to resist the use of conflict loans which were both of which were at the root of the prior financial crises in the country so where do you feel Moldova stands on building up the resiliency of the finance sector including through the central bank and and the role of the parliament in that thank you we have come a very long way from the banking fraud when 12 percent of GDP were siphoned off and Moldovan taxpayers ended up footing that bill and will continue to pay for that hole in the budget for years to come but the banking sector has become a lot more resilient and I'm reminded every day when I go to the bank about that resilience because as a politician as a politically exposed person have to provide all kinds of paperwork to the bank every time for like 100 euros or 500 euros or whatnot any transaction it's but I'm reminded of why that is in place and I am of course frustrated by the paperwork but I am also very unhappy that that was not in place when the fraud actually happened because if everything was in place and all those mechanisms were in place then Moldovan taxpayers would not be left hanging with with that incredible burden for years to come to be paid but now the banking sector and the central bank and all the private banks have implemented robust measures that the threat of the banking sector being used against the Republic of Moldova is a lot lower and the banking sector now we are looking at in our effort to dual oligarchization it's a tough word to reduce the influence of oligarchs in Moldova the banking sector has an important role to play and given that all of our oligarchs and our fugitives and are outside the country the fact that the banking sector has all those mechanisms in place to keep them at bay and not allow them to use the banking sector to increase their malign influence or the Russian influence I'm confident that the measures that have been put in place will keep those nefarious influences at bay unfortunately what is a lot more difficult to mitigate is the cash the money mules that the Russians have been using now in elections we have the 10k limit which is like everywhere else and we cannot sort of address that because then we would hurt a lot of law-abiding citizens but they were exploiting and using money mules to carry cash into the country to buy those votes in elections so we are trying to mitigate that at the exchange office it's a mixed result so far but that's part of the bigger societal effort and the bigger reform that we're implementing in the justice sector and the anti-corruption center so that we can mitigate some of those avenues but in terms of the banking sector I'm confident knock on wood that will never be in a position that we were 10 years ago where we ended up being known as you know the country that that allowed itself to to 12% of GDP being stolen that's that's not a tagline that that I want to see for my country I have enough questions for the next four hours but I'm kind I'm mindful of the time we have just a few minutes left and this side of the room has been hogging all the questions I want to give this side of the room a chance if there are questions sir you want L is coming with the microphone good afternoon everyone I'm lieutenant general poparado in a national army of republic of Moldova officer currently I'm a student at the national defense university here in washington dc doing my master degree in strategic studies and one of my paper actually is a russian influence in Moldova so I will take this advantage to ask again mr hill a question regarding Moldova and russian influence so in your opinion what is a russian center of gravity in in Moldova and what are the critical vulnerabilities that can we target in order to make this center of gravity fall apart thank you well thank you and I instructed a couple of your predecessors when I was on the faculty of the national war college the center yeah I think you can deduce from what I said the center of gravity of russian influence right now is is the Moldovan public is what they they need to do is to manipulate enough of the electorate so as to be able to take control or participate in control of one or more important institutions in Moldova and Moldova clearly that's going to be the parliament the they were successful in electing a boshkan in gagausia but fortunately that that that influence can be limited and has already had a reaction locally as well as on the national level but there is a real risk in the electorate because historically the electorate has gone back and forth between center right center left governments and it's been shown that some of the the center left governments have been overtly or moderately pro-russian or subject to russian influence and I think that's what the what Moscow is trying to do now both covertly and overtly uh and the Moldova you know the government is engaged in a number of measures already that that mr. Popshoi has has mentioned there are others that that will have to be done you know identifying overt operators the the money mules many many other things of trying to sneak people into Moldova and what they do do overtly through media through disinformation and in simply buying votes the shore party has special stores where people go and get them buy stuff at a discount and other stuff as long as they vote the correct way in the orche region one of the regions and you know try to expand that in any case that's that the politics ironically is now really because Moldova has transnistria has transformed a bit Moldova has dealt relatively successfully with the energy problem and it's now central is the political challenge that is posed by this interference that's my perception and that I think over the next year or so is going to be the real the most important fight for those who wish to keep Moldova on its present course thank you so I think we can do one more quick question and then I'm going to give deputy speaker pop joy the opportunity to give us a last word I think there was one more on this side no let's go back over here thank you thank you so much yes yeah that's a matter from Georgia currently the fletcher scope along diplomacy uh phd candidate um I have a problem about question about the topic of disinformation in Moldova you uh deputy speaker you address some aspects of it could you let us know what are some of the critical outstanding areas as it relates to russian disinformation in Moldova where experts and western allies could help more and expedite the process hopefully well as I mentioned the institution that we are building now headed by our former minister of interior under Ivanko the strategic communication unit we hope that with the help of our international partners we'll be able to provide enough capacity to this institution to be indeed the bulwark against the the russian influence online and offline and so that the other institutions can take actions but also we need to be more proactive at the societal level we need to educate the citizens so that they can understand what are the the threats towards Moldova security because now having lived in the russian propaganda bubble sometimes you find the situations that are really heartbreaking and painful to to to take when you have a citizen who is denying the fact and the horror of the russian aggression in ukraine while in the neighboring house you have ukraine refugees living so when you have this sort of reality and this sort of of pernicious russian propaganda it will take a long time for us to be able to break through but that's where we need to to invest a lot more that's where I mentioned that we are now channeling our resources and hopefully we'll be successful in creating in the public broadcaster channel that is in russian language that will provide quality content that we try to win over some of those citizens who have been living in this russian propaganda bubble but there is a lot more to be done also in the political realm that the russians have been using political parties to advocate their agenda but this is an effort that we need to to mitigate together as a society and i'm confident that with the support of our international partners and on the way to our european accession we'll be able to address the challenge yeah thank you for that question i'm fantastic haircut by the way so the deputy speaker's comments actually are a good reminder that you know moldova is not alone in dealing with with russian malign influence dare i say it even here in the united states we have at times had our challenges in detecting and resisting russia's malign influence and so one of the the takeaways i hope from this session is that there's even more that we can be doing with other countries that are victims of russia's malign influence to share experiences share best practices share techniques share technologies basically anything that can help our societies um resist the the messaging resist the influence resist the corruption resist all of the ways in which russia tries to penetrate and to gain influence in in our in our societies and so um with that any last words mr deputy speaker i just want to mention that after 30 years of dealing with this luggage without a handle the community of independent states which isn't much of a community and not a lot of independence being allowed to these members we are exiting now and we've been voting with by the dozens all kinds of multilateral agreements that we had in the cis and moldova is taking ownership of its independence of its sovereignty and we are thankful for our international partners for supporting us in the challenging times moldova wants to be something that uh it was denied he wants to be a proper european state to return to european family of nations so that in moldova people can live in peace comfortably pray to whoever they want to pray love whoever they want to love vote for whoever they want to vote and we are committed to providing all those uh uh rights and freedoms to our citizens and thanks to the generous support of our partners in the european union and in the transatlantic community i'm confident that we can mitigate the challenges that our societies are facing and we'll continue to stand with ukraine and we count of all of our international partners in doing just that thank you i hope you'll help me in thanking deputy speaker pub shoy and ambassador hill for this session thank you all