Bomb threats made in recent days against targets in and around the capital of Moldova, Chisinau, have led to fears that Russia could be attempting to sow chaos in that country ahead of a possible invasion. The worries are compounded by an uptick in political turmoil inside the country that is sandwiched between NATO-member Romania and Ukraine. 

It is a location coveted by Moscow, which could conceivably use Moldova as a staging ground to launch an attack on Odessa or support such an attack. The most important Ukrainian port city on the Black Sea, Odessa is about 30 miles to the west of Moldova’s most southeasterly point. 

Also at issue is the pro-Russian breakaway region of Transnistria, which split from Moldova in 1992 and where upward of 1,600 Russian troops are already stationed. On top of that, a local separatist force is estimated at about 20,000, according to the Times of London, which also reported that threats sent using “dark web tools” led to Chisinau’s airport having to suspend operations and be evacuated more than 10 times in the past month.  

The deputy prime minister tasked with reintegrating Transnistria into Moldova, Oleg Serebrian, told the British newspaper, “We have phone calls — there is a bomb in the airport, in the parliament building — practically every day,” adding: “The main idea is to spread fear, instability. From who? We can guess.”

Adding fuel to Russia’s ire is Moldova’s determined pivot to the West since Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. The country was accepted as a candidate member of the European Union on June 23, and as the Sun has previously reported, it is likely that Britain has been supplying Moldova with NATO-grade weapons since the late spring. The British foreign secretary, Liz Truss, met with her Moldovan counterpart in May, following a meeting of British and Molodovan diplomats at Chisinau.

Speaking in Romania last month, Moldova’s president, Maia Sandu, said that “Russia’s war against Ukraine has thrown our region into uncertainty. Moldova is, after Ukraine, the country most affected by the war.” That statement, or more accurately understatement, came on the heels of an announcement made at Tiraspol, the nominal capital of Transnistria, by the putative Transnistrian foreign minister, Vitaly Ignatyev, of a plan for the rogue region’s accession to the Russian Federation. 

That is when the bomb threats started to increase, according to Mr. Serebrian, who also told The Times of London that “the war in Ukraine means we worry that this is not simply a declaration but a kind of prelude to an operation in Moldova.”

There are already reportedly nearly half a million Ukrainian refugees in Moldova; any attempt by Moscow to move from provocation to military operation would throw the country into complete chaos and risk drawing in NATO due to Moldova’s long border with Romania.

Underscoring just how firmly Moldova is on Kyiv’s radar, Ukraine as far back as April offered Chisinau military assistance to help it retake Transnistria. Doing so would then theoretically free up border troops for the looming battles to restore Ukraine’s control over all of its Black Sea coast. Moldovan officials have said they would decline any such offer were it ever to be officially made, but they continue to call on Russia to withdraw its troops from Transnistria. 

Given Moldova’s delicate geographical location, however, there is only so much flexing of muscle that it can presently do. Now, even though the fighting is going on across the border in Ukraine, sophisticated bomb threats and an unusually strong stream of pro-Kremlin rhetoric from problematic Transnistria point to a sharpening of battle lines. Moscow has always played a long game in these obscure corners of eastern Europe, often to its advantage. Yet with Moldova on edge even as Western allies like Britain are throwing their weight behind it, and Ukraine watching warily just a whisker away, it will not likely remain a game forever.