After abruptly ousting her Prime Minister last week and replacing her with a designate approved by the Western security apparatus, the President of the Republic of Moldova, Maia Sandu, working in coordination with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is moving to bring her country into the conflict in the neighboring country. This is causing serious consternation in the country as Moldova is bound to neutrality by its constitution.
With relations worsening between Hungary and the Zelensky Regime in Ukraine, Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó issued an official statement on Friday denouncing Kiev’s mistreatment of ethnic minorities, in particular the Hungarians living in the Transcarpathia region occupied by the Soviets after World War II and forcibly annexed to Ukraine.
Internal political struggles within the pro-Western government in Chișinău have led to the resignation of Prime Minister Natalia Gavriliță. President Maia Sandu quickly named her National Security Advisor Dorin Recean as Prime Minister designate. He will have fifteen days to form a new government.
According to Ukrainian officials, Friday saw more of the eerily consistent nationwide missile strikes that Russia has been conducting across the country for months. However, there was a noticeable uptick in the number of strikes Russia conducted on Friday with Moscow firing up to 35 S-300 missiles at Zaporizhzhia and the Kharkiv region. The escalated strikes caused additional power outages overnight across the country.
On Thursday, Matt Gaetz will introduce a resolution in the House that calls for the Biden administration to cease U.S. military and financial assistance to Ukraine. The measure also calls for a peace agreement as the war will enter its second year on February 24.
Despite being mixed up in corruption scandals last month involving the Ukrainian government, it does not appear that Oleksii Reznikov will lose his position as Ukraine’s Defense Minister this week, according to a statement from President Volodymyr Zelensky on Monday. However, Ukraine’s ruling party, Servant of the People, issued a statement on Sunday indicating that Reznikov will be replaced as Defense Minister at some point.
Dömötör called the resolution “everything but a call for peace, more like a big step towards the escalation of the war. The 7th point of the resolution calls for deliveries of more armored vehicles and ammunition, to be followed by long-distance missile systems and fighter jets to the war-torn country.”
In an interview with TV presenter Dmitry Kiselyov, the Russian Foreign Minister spoke on the situation in Ukraine and made somber predictions about the fate of Moldova. He accused President Maia Sandu of “doing almost anything,” even uniting with Romania, to get NATO protection. His statement hit a chord with many who know Moldova was part of Romania until 1940. The people of Moldova speak Romanian, have the same religion, and keep the same traditions as all Romanians.
“If you send weapons, if you finance the entire annual budget of one of the belligerents,” the Hungarian Prime Minister pointed out, “if you promise more and more weapons, more and more modern weapons, then you can say whatever you want. No matter what you say, you are in the war.”
In addition to the Biden administration sending an additional $2.2 billion in military aid to Ukraine, this round will include longer-range rockets that Kyiv has been eager to receive. The donation of longer-range rockets comes a week after the U.S. and Germany announced that they would be sending M1 Abrams tanks, Bradley Fighting Vehicles, and Leopard tanks to Ukraine.