The foreign relations of Romania are conducted by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Romania is a member of the European Union and NATO.
Moldovan or Moldavian is one of the two local names for the Romanian language in Moldova. Moldovan was declared the official language of Moldova in Article 13 of the constitution adopted in 1994, while the 1991 Declaration of Independence of Moldova used the name Romanian. In 2003, the Moldovan parliament adopted a law defining Moldovan and Romanian as glottonyms for the same language. In 2013, the Constitutional Court of Moldova interpreted that Article 13 of the constitution is superseded by the Declaration of Independence, thus giving official status to the name Romanian. The breakaway region of Transnistria continues to recognize "Moldavian" as one of its official languages, alongside Russian and Ukrainian. Ukraine also continued until recently to make a distinction between Moldovan and Romanian, with one village declaring its language to be Romanian and another declaring it to be Moldovan, though Ukrainian officials have announced an intention to remove the legal status of Moldovan. On 16 November 2023, the Ministry of Education and Science of the Ukrainian government stated that it has initiated steps to abolish the Moldovan language and to replace it with Romanian. On 13 January 2024, Ukrainian newspaper Dumska reported that the Ukrainian Ministry of Education and Science had announced all 16 schools in Odesa Oblast teaching "Moldovan" had dropped the term in favor of Romanian. On 16 March 2023, the Moldovan Parliament approved a law on referring to the national language as Romanian in all legislative texts and the constitution. On 22 March, the president of Moldova, Maia Sandu, promulgated the law.
Chișinău International Airport is Moldova's main international airport, located 13 km (8.1 mi) southeast of the centre of Chișinău, the capital city. It served as headquarters for Air Moldova, the country's national airline.
The Ministry of Labour and Social Protection of Romania is one of the eighteen ministries of the Government of Romania.
The Trupele de Carabinieri is the national gendarmerie force of the Republic of Moldova, under the administration of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Moldova. The Moldovan Carabinieri are to ensure, together with the police or independently, public order, protection of rights and freedoms of citizens, owners' properties and prevention of violations of the law. The structure of the agency is based on the Italian Carabinieri, where it gets its name.
Bălți International Airport — also known as Bălți–Leadoveni International Airport — is the second-largest international civilian airport in Moldova and one of the two main airports in Bălți, serving the city of Bălți and northern Moldova for civil passenger and cargo flights. Bălți-Leadoveni International Airport was opened in 1989 to replace Bălți-City Airport particularly on international routes and to ease air traffic to Chișinău International Airport.
The official state language of Moldova is Romanian, which is the native language of 78.6% of the population ; it is also spoken as a primary language by other ethnic minorities. Gagauz, Russian, and Ukrainian languages are granted official regional status in Gagauzia and/or Transnistria.
Moldova–Russia relations are the bilateral relations between the Republic of Moldova and the Russian Federation, two Eastern European, post-Soviet, ex-communist countries. Russian support for the self-proclaimed Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic (Transnistria) and a substantial Russian military presence therein strained Moldovan relations with Russia.
Zinaida Greceanîi is a Moldovan politician. She was the President of the Moldovan Parliament between 8 June 2019 to 26 July 2021. Greceanîi was previously also the Prime Minister of Moldova from 31 March 2008 to 14 September 2009. She led the Party of Socialists of the Republic of Moldova (PSRM) from 2016 to 2020 and was previously a member of the Party of Communists of the Republic of Moldova (PCRM). She was Moldova's first female Prime Minister and was the second female Communist head of government in Europe, preceded only by Premier Milka Planinc of former Yugoslavia. She has been referred to by her colleagues in PSRM as the "Moldovan Margaret Thatcher".
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is one of the fourteen ministries of the Government of Moldova.
The Ministry of Education and Research is one of the fourteen ministries of the Government of Moldova. The ministry was established on 27 May 1953.
The Ministry of Agriculture and Food Industry is one of the fourteen Moldovan ministries, being the central body of public administration, subordinated to the Government. It has the mission to ensure the realization of the constitutional prerogatives of the Government in the development and promotion of state policy of sustainable development of Agro-industrial sector of the country, by increasing competitiveness and productivity in the sector and ensuring the safety and food sufficiency in the country in order to create the premises for permanent increase in welfare. The current minister is Vladimir Bolea.
The Ministry of Economic Development and Digitalization is one of the fourteen ministries of the Government of Moldova.
The accession of Moldova to the European Union (EU) is on the current agenda for future enlargement of the EU.
Nicolae "Nicu" Popescu is a Moldovan author and diplomat who served as Minister of Foreign Affairs and European Integration of Moldova from 6 August 2021 until 26 January 2024 in the Gavrilita and then Recean cabinets. He was also Moldova's Foreign Minister from 11 June to 14 November 2019 in the Sandu Cabinet. Until his appointment, he was the director of the Wider Europe programme of the European Council on Foreign Relations and visiting professor at Sciences Po-Paris.
The COVID-19 pandemic in Moldova was a part of the worldwide pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2. The virus was confirmed to have reached the Republic of Moldova on 7 March 2020, when a Moldovan woman who returned from Italy tested positive for the novel coronavirus. As the number of infected people started to rise during the next days, the Parliament declared a state of emergency on 17 March 2020 for the entire territory of the Republic of Moldova for a period of 60 days.
The Guard Battalion of the Moldovan National Army is a unit in the Moldovan Ground Forces. It is based in the capital of Chișinău, specifically at Military Camp 142. The battalion was formed on October 16, 1992. It shares the same birthday as the Independent Engineer Battalion "Codru" and the Communications and Informatics Center.
On 18 September 2022, protests in Moldova began in the capital city of Chișinău, demanding the resignation of the country's pro-Western government, amid an energy crisis causing rising natural gas prices and inflation, caused in part by the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Starting in late 2022, Moldova suffered an energy crisis, the worst since its independence. Hugely influenced by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, caused when Russia's Gazprom reduced supplies.
Events from the year 2023 in Moldova.
