Is Moldova on the verge of war? Cancellation of Wizz Air flights

One of Europe’s largest low-cost airlines, the Hungarian company Wizz Air will suspend flights to and from Moldova from March 14.

Volodymyr Zelensky believes that Russia can invade other states, not only Ukraine. The biggest threat, in his opinion, hangs over Moldova. Kyiv has given Chisinau a Russian plan to destabilize the situation in the country and organize a coup d’état. Pro-Russian protests have begun in Moldova, however, so far disguised as social protests. And now the first Western airline also refused to fly to the country. What’s happening?

Without air travel

One of the largest low-cost airlines in Europe, the Hungarian company Wizz Air will suspend flights to and from Moldova from March 14. The company’s press service said that it was a “difficult but responsible decision”, connected to “recent events” in Moldova and in “although not one hundred percent, but a high risk in the country’s airspace”.

Landing in Transnistria

Earlier, on February 27, the press secretary of the operational command of the South of the Ukrainian army, Natalia Gumenyuk, spoke about the possibility of a Russian landing in Transnistria. He stressed that this is impossible: “After all, it is necessary to cross the airspace of any of the NATO countries or directly to Ukraine. Well, who will allow them!”.

Ukrainian forces are concentrated on the border between Ukraine and Moldova in the part controlled by the authorities of Transnistria. The probability that Russia will open a second front from the side of Transnistria, he called low.

But only the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation at the end of February twice said that Ukraine was allegedly planning an invasion of Transnistria. On the morning of February 23, the department issued a statement stating that the Armed Forces of Ukraine will conduct an offensive of Russian troops from the territory of Transnistria and, under this pretext, to organize an “armed provocation” against Tiraspol. The ministry warned that the “implementation of planned provocation” threatened Russian peacekeepers in Transnistria and promised an adequate response.

In this regard, Andrey Demchenko, a representative of the State Border Service of Ukraine, said on February 24 that the Ukrainian-Moldova section of the border in the Transnistrian region was reinforced by units of border guards, the army and the National Guard of Ukraine. Kyiv, since the beginning of a large-scale war, pays attention to it as on the borders of Belarus and Russia, because it does not rule out that it can be used to attack Ukrainian territory, Demchenko added.

RF provocation

Moscow may be preparing false-flag operations in Transnistria, according to experts at the American Institute for the Study of War (ISW), which monitors the events of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict on a daily basis. ISW experts said that the press releases of the Russian Ministry of Defense about Ukraine’s “armed provocation” in Transnistria do not talk about Russia’s plans to attack Moldova (the Kremlin does not have enough strength for this, says ISW), but indicates increasing efforts to undermine the Moldovan state.