MOLDOVA: A separatist, mostly Russian-speaking region of Moldova was lambasted yesterday by Europe's main human rights body and neighbouring Romania, as it continued its drive forcibly to close schools that teach in the Romanian language.
Monitors from the 55-nation Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) were barred from Transdniestr, a month after branding the ruling regime's crackdown on Romanian-language teaching as "linguistic cleansing". Transdniestr claimed de facto independence from Moldova after a war in 1992.
The breakaway region said it would not allow the monitors back in while it investigated an alleged collision this week between an OSCE vehicle and a local policeman. The OSCE denied the accident ever took place and accused Transdniestr's leadership of breaking an 11-year agreement allowing it open access to the region.
The European Union and Amnesty International have also condemned Transdniestr's campaign to eradicate Romanian from its schoolrooms. The province says it will allow teaching in Moldovan - effectively Romanian written in Cyrillic script - as was the norm in Soviet times.
Moldova descended into civil war as the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, and Transdniestr's Russian community feared that it would be subsumed by Romania.
With its own economy in difficulty, Romania has little desire to adopt its impoverished north-eastern neighbour, but Bucharest tore into Transdniestr's tactics yesterday.
"The Transdniestr authorities are aiming at ethnic cleansing as part of a larger strategy" against Romanian-speakers," said Romania's Prime Minister, Mr Adrian Nastase.
About two-thirds of Moldovans speaks Romanian, and 4,300 schoolchildren study the language in Transdniestr, a sliver of land wedged between Moldova and Ukraine. After Transdniestr ordered the closure of eight schools last month, parents, teachers and students locked themselves inside in protest.