Ignatiev: " Transnistrian region poses no threat to anyone"
Russia's alleged provocations by Kiev near the border with the Transnistrian region notwithstanding, the alleged Tiraspol Foreign Minister Vitalie Ignatiev said that the left bank of the Dniester is an "island of stability".
"The Transnistrian region could not be a threat to anyone. The Transnistrian region cannot be a threat to Moldovans or to Ukraine. We obviously have no such plans. Normally, we try to accuse Transnistria of being a threat in order to cause some kind of tension later. This is extremely negative and is not a realistic scenario, so we are working to get it right. Transnistria, on the contrary, is an island of stability," said the so-called Tiraspol Foreign Minister Vitalie Ignatiev.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian State Border Service spokesman Andrei Demcenko said the authorities were tightening controls on the border with the Transnistrian region, where the Ukrainian army had begun erecting a network of fortifications, RBC news agency reports.
"We understand the perfidy of the enemy, we understand that there can be provocations at any moment. We must be ready to act in all directions, including the Transnistrian segment," Andrei Demcenko said.
Natalia Gumeniuk, head of the press centre of Ukraine's Southern Task Force, said the Ukrainian military did not rule out the possibility of provocations and shelling on the border with Transnistria, according to the RBC news agency.
A Ukrainian army representative stressed that the situation on the border with Moldova is stable and there is no threat of opening a second front. According to Natalia Gumeniuk, Ukrainian border guards are monitoring the situation in the Transnistrian region and are ready to respond to threats.
However, the Ukrainian official said that Russian accusations about possible provocations in the region by Ukraine are nothing but disinformation to destabilise the situation in Moldova.
