On March 27, 2009, the University„Alexandru Ioan Cuza”of Iasi hosted the Regional Conference "Baltic Sea – Black Sea Region after the war in Georgia and in the midst of a global economic recession", organised by Moldova Foundation on behalf of the Initiative Black Sea – Baltic Sea (USA) and the Institute for Political Sciences and International Relations in cooperation with the faculty of Sociology and Social Assistance of the University of Bucharest (a detailed program could be seen here).
The participants at the Conference were greeted by Constantin Simirad, president of Iasi County Council. The moderator of the first panel " Security challenges within the geopolitical context after the war in Georgia" was Vlad Spânu, director of Moldova Foundation, USA, and of the secont panel "Advancing towards European Union standards and norms in the countries of the Baltic Black Sea region" was Ion Bulei, senior researcher at the Institute of Political Sciences and International Relations, Bucharest.
Among those who took the floor we noticed, at the first panel, Kalman Mizsei, EU Special Representative for the Republic of Moldova; Natalia Belitser, Pylyp Orlyk Institute for Democracy, Ukraina; Valeriu Mitul, Burgomaster of Corjova, Republic of Moldova and Ion Manole, President of the Association for Human Rights Promo-Lex, and at the second panel: Maria Petre, member of the European Parliament, member in the Committee of Cooperation EU – Republic of Moldova (Romania); George Dura, Researcher, Centre for European Policy Studies (Belgium); Nadine Gogu, Independent Center of Journalism (Republic of Moldova); Dan Dungaciu, Professor, University of Bucharest (ISPRI, Romania).
The debates highlited, by comparing the situation in the the two regions, the particularly special situation in the Black Sea Region, where there are different political regimes, different cultures, tensions and active or frozen conflicts, and there is also an interference, under different forms and from different reasons of geostrategic intersts, like those of Russia, United States or European Union.
The conflict in Georgia was less evoked, like many other subjects suggested by the conference general scope and panels, as most of the participants showed a particular interest towards the developments in the Republic of Moldova, with a special focus on the forthcoming legislative elections in this country, persistence of the conflict in Transnistria, being deplored the lack of credible initiatives and even of interest to put an end to this source of unrest. Also the situation of the human rights and the freedom of mass-media were evoked, in these particularly domains being present elements of totalitarian slideaway. The situation was approached comparatively for the two regions. It is obvious that in the Baltic states, for example, all rights concerning the freedom of mass media are observed, there were no longer recorded abuses against journalists, the pluralism of opinions is accepted and the internet access is generalised.
Nor the cooperation between Romania and the Republic of Moldova has been forgotten by the participants, including from the official side, some opinions, not generally shared, emphasising that Romania has not a adquate legislative and institutional framework capable to promote and support the relations between the two countries.
A much wider presentation of the event (in Romanian language) you could read here!
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