In this episode I talk with Dr. William H Hill about the Transnistrian War and subsequent attempts to resolve the conflict and reunite Moldova. Dr. Hill is a Global Fellow at the Wilson Center and served as the Head of the OSCE Mission to Moldova from 2003 to 2006 and from 1999 to 2001 where he participated in the two major efforts at brokering a resolution to the conflict.
It’s a long episode but one that is really worth listening to end to end. Dr. Hill had a front row seat to major events in Moldovan history and personally interacted with many of the key players in this frozen conflict.
I tried to define / explain key terms as we went through but here are a few things to understand before listening:
Right Bank / Left Bank - These terms are used to refer to the parts of Moldova controlled by Chisinau and Tiraspol (Transnistria). The term references the sides of the Nistru river from the perspective of the direction of flow of the river. The Right Bank refers to the parts of Moldova controlled by the Chisinau government, and the Left Bank refers to Transnistria.
CSCE / OSCE - These acronyms refer to the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and its predecessor the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe
As Dr. Hill lives in the DC Metro area, we held this conversation over zoom. There are a few areas where the audio quality has some issues and Dr. Hill’s cat and my dogs make a few guest appearances. But overall this first test of a remote recording went well and you shouldn’t notice many issues.
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Links:
Dr. Hill’s biography at the Wilson Center
Moldova Matters article about the April 2023 incident in the security zone referenced in the podcast
Episode 5: Transnistria