Managing Intractable Conflicts: Lessons from Moldova and Cyprus

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Civil Society and Transnistrian Conflict Settlement 33 CIVIL SOCIETY AND TRANSNISTRIAN CONFLICT SETTLEMENT By Denis Cenusa 1 General Aspects The post-conflict decade drastically influenced people-to-people communication leading to the separate and autonomous development of two different types of civil societies on each side of the Dniester River. Consequently, as each side of the river possess two distinguished political systems, the civic sector in the constitutional territory and the one belonging to the Transnistrian region have worked within different legal, institutional and political conditions for years. Actions on the horizontal and vertical levels should be considered for bridging the two distinct civil societies, having the acceptance and the involvement of the constitutional authorities and the administration from Tiraspol. Legal and Institutional Aspects Following the ideology of self-determination while creating closer ties with Russia, the civil entities on the left bank have been discouraged from building contacts with their colleagues from the other side. Simultaneously, the officials in Chisinau have shown strong reservations over encouraging civil society to work across the country, including in the Transnistrian region. Even though legislation since 1996 has favored the development of a civil society (Republic of Moldova. Parliament, 2010), the first official framework for developing a cooperation between state and civil society was introduced in 2005 with the Concept of Cooperation between Parliament and the Civil Society (Republic of Moldova. Parliament, 2005). The cooperation establishes the main fields and forms in which the legislative body is able to interact with non-governmental organizations. But the mechanism encompasses only the non-governmental organizations registered in the constitutional territory, which de facto means the exclusion of the civic entities set-up on the left bank from the cooperation. A similar deficiency, although in this case the result of a lack of resources, can be observed in the “consultative body” created between the Government, civil 1 Denis Cenusa is an independent expert and political commentator.
34 Managing Intractable Conflicts: Lessons from Moldova and Cyprus society and private sector, aiming to develop and promote a strategic partnership for strengthening a participative democracy (Government of the Republic of Moldova, 2010). Having been established later, the civil society in the Transnistrian region continuously suffers because of the lack of financial resources and of project management experience, which makes it uncompetitive in comparison with partners from the right bank. However, as the Transnistrian region is outside of the consultative framework, there is a need for an increase in the transfer of knowledge and experience in order to facilitate their rapprochement and potential re-integration. Human Rights Issue Human rights is one of the most complex and inflamed topics related to the Transnistrian region, largely due to the fact that the constitutional authorities are incapable of ensuring the functionality of the legal order within their national borders. In this respect, the horizontal cooperation between the two civil societies has become a vital, yet still unaddressed, priority. In reality, there are only a few organizations who work to promote human rights on the right bank. The existing problem with human rights was highlighted in the last European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) judgment concerning the case of Moldovan/Romanian language schools in Transnistria (ECHR, 2012). While the ECHR mentioned only the violation of the right to education in the previous report, a subsequent report prepared by the association “Promo-Lex” (2011) catalogued a more complete list of all other human rights infringements in the uncontrolled region. Additionally, the national authorities are not prepared to propose a clear and structured action plan which would protect citizens from the abusive actions of the separatist regime. In this respect, an analysis of the National Plan in the context of human rights between 2011-2014 (Republic of Moldova. Parliament, 2011a) proves that state institutions are preventing themselves from taking steps forward. Also, they are far from stimulating the NGOs on the right bank to act individually, and show a reluctance to establish a framework for common partnerships between the civil stakeholders on each side. An example of an incentive that could activate the interest of the Trandsnistrian civil society is an amendment to the Law on Civil Associations (Republic of Moldova. Parliament, 2011b). By extending the status of public utility to encompass NGOs, it would be possible to develop bilateral projects, including Trandsnistrian partners, with those who work partially or exclusively in the region.
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Managing Intractable Conflicts: Lessons from Moldova and Cyprus

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