“Accusations of Russophobia against us are ridiculous. I remind opposition politicians that there are about 200 schools in our country with instruction in Russian and that there is mutual understanding between the Romanian-speaking majority (about 80%) and the Russian-speaking minority. This civilized communication is maintained despite Russia’s attempts to sow division. We have thousands of Russian-speaking citizens from Comrat, Taraclia, the Transnistrian region and Ukraine who work in Chisinau and other cities – and absolutely no one discriminates against them. I very much hope that over time they will also gradually master the Romanian language,” emphasized PAS deputy Radu Marian in support of the decision to exclude friendship groups with the legislatures of the Russian Federation and the Republic of Belarus.
This decision was taken by the Permanent Bureau of the Moldovan Parliament, where the majority of deputies represent the PAS faction. The leader of the PSRM faction, former Moldovan President Igor Dodon, submitted an amendment to this decision at Friday’s plenary session, proposing to restore the Moldovan-Russian and Moldovan-Belarusian friendship groups. However, the amendment did not get the necessary number of votes of MPs.
Our Party faction MP Elena Gritsko spoke in favor of restoring the parliamentary friendship groups with the Russian Federation and Belarus.
“When the parliamentary majority decided to suspend the activity of these groups, did you think about what effect this decision has for Moldovan citizens in Russia and Belarus? More than a hundred thousand of our compatriots live there – people who work, study and live there. Has anyone thought about the fate of our students? About the Moldovan-Russian and Moldovan-Belarusian trade relations, which continue to benefit our economy?” – Elena Gritsko said. She said that by restoring these friendship groups, “we will be able to contribute to ending this terrible war”.
In the end, the amendment was not adopted. As a result, the XII Parliament has 54 parliamentary friendship groups with different states. According to the principle of proportionality, 34 friendship groups will be led by members of the parliamentary majority and 20 groups will be led by members of the opposition.
As in the previous convocation, the group with Romania will remain the largest friendship group. It is headed by PAS deputy Veronica Roşca and includes 55 deputies.
For the first time, the legislature created separate friendship groups with Central Asian countries.
According to the procedure, the nominal composition of the parliamentary friendship groups is determined on the basis of elections made by the deputies, and the distribution of the positions of group chairmen is based on the proportional representation of political parties in the Parliament.
Parliament Speaker Ihor Grosu headed the friendship group with Japan.
