Uneasy calm of a city awaiting Putin’s ‘provocations’

We want strong Russia, not a ‘mad bear’, say residents of unrecognised Moldovan breakaway region

‘It is really scary. I am not waiting around to be raped by a Russian soldier’

Life, you feel, for people living in Tiraspol, a well-groomed Soviet-designed town on the edge of Europe, should be safe, secure and steady.

It is a capital city, after all, with a central bank that controls its own currency, has a football team that beat the mighty Real Madrid six months ago and, possibly, boasts the world’s newest statue of Harry Potter.

And yet some are nervous.

“It’s this awful war in Ukraine and the provocations,” said a dapperlydressed man as he strolled down October 25th Street, named after the date the Bolsheviks took power in 1917.

Tiraspol, with a population of 135,000, is the capital of the unrecognised Moldovan breakaway region of Transnistria that borders Ukraine. Not even Russia, which guarantees its security, considers Transnistria to be an independent nation despite its Soviet-style coat of arms designed around the hammer and sickle.

Backed by Russia, the region broke away from Moldova in 1992, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, after a war that killed around 1,000 people. It is a 250-mile stretch of land that hugs the eastern bank of the Dniester River and is famed for its wine and caviar.

The dapperly-dressed man paused. Life in an unrecognised state has complications, he explained with more than a hint of ruefulness, although low unemployment and a low crime rate counter such inconveniences.

“But this changed when Russia started its terrible war in Ukraine,” he said. “We want a strong Russian bear but not a mad bear.”

And the outlook for the 400,000 people living in Transnistria appeared to worsen again last week when a series of explosions, blamed on pro-ukrainian forces, destroyed an unmanned government building in Tiraspol and two communication masts. Western analysts have warned that the Kremlin may use these “terrorist attacks” as a pretext to invade Moldova from Transnistria.

The timing is certainly alarming. A Russian general has claimed the Kremlin wanted to rescue “repressed” Transnistria it by capturing Ukraine’s southern coast to form a landbridge.

But central Tiraspol showed no signs of war preparations. Families were out eating ice-creams and cracking jokes. There were no pro-war Z logos that have sprung up in Russia.

There are, reportedly, some 1,500 Russian soldiers in Transnistria but spring cleaning, rather than war preparations, appeared to be the order of the day at one of Tiraspol’s dilapidated military bases as soldiers in t-shirts slapped red paint on to a gate.

Transnistria’s edginess, though, sometimes shows itself. “I am very worried about provocations and about the future,” said Irina, a bank clerk. “But I have nowhere to go.”

In Chisinau, some feel threatened and have made plans to flee. Mihaela, 33, a psychologist, said she had a grab-bag packed and a plan to dash to neighbouring Romania if Russia captured Odesa, a three-hour drive away. “It is really scary,” she said. “I am not waiting around to be raped by a Russian soldier.”

But Moldova has Romanian and Russian speakers, and opinion on Putin is also split. Svetlana, vaping and fiddling with her Bluetooth earphone, said: “Of course the Ukrainians had it coming. Putin is right. They are fascists.”