Mr Deputy Prime Minister, ladies and gentlemen.

On behalf of the British Embassy Chisinau and DFID Moldova, please allow me to welcome you to the Transnistrian Dialogues. This session of the Dialogues is a very special one. It is a master class which brings together the best graduates of previous programs and as such it bears a special significance for us.

The British Embassy Chisinau and DFID Moldova have supported a number of programs related to Transnistria. We have always tried to be innovative in our approaches and daring in our aims. Of all our programs, the Dialogues have a special place. It is one of our most successful projects and one that has exceeded expectations. Our special thanks for that go to the Foreign Policy Association, especially Andrei Popov, Radu Vrabie, Victor Chirila, Eugen Revenco and Victoria Boean, as well as their counterparts – both past and present - at the British Embassy Chisinau and DFID Moldova, in particular Victor Munteanau and Vlad Kluminski. Without their commitment, creativity and perseverance it simply would not have been possible.

Mr Deputy Prime Minister, ladies and gentlemen. We all have our frameworks of perception that help us to make sense of the world around us. We sometimes find it hard to accept that reality is multi-faceted and that it usually defies our attempts to squeeze it into ready-made frameworks. It is inevitable that we skip important nuances and can never account for all sides of the story.  It should not therefore surprise us that one and the same event may have widely different interpretations. 

The Transnistrian dialogues are a unique and a very special forum because they constantly challenges – and in fact, were designed to do just that – our frameworks of perception, our entrenched understanding and interpretation of events.

Through open and frank discussion, we overcome misconceptions and prejudices and open up other sides of reality for ourselves. A famous Russian philosopher, Lev Shestov, once quipped that ‘a clash of opinion leads to the clash of the people who have those opinions and never elicits the truth’.  But our goal here is more modest. We only want to try to understand other interpretations, other views, to see events from a different angle which does not necessarily coincide with ours. That in itself is a big step towards compromise.

Your country is at a crossroads. History has never been particularly kind to Moldova and has never set easy tasks for you. Moldova does have a unique chance to become a functioning state, but it would require all your talent, your skills, commitment and perseverance to make that happen. You know, there is a common misconception that the Transnistrian conflict can only be resolved through a secret agreement of the "great powers" and that therefore there is little, if anything, that the parties to the conflict can do themselves to promote a solution. In this view, Moldova and Transnistria are destined to lag behind until the time becomes ripe for the "great powers" to address the issue.

In some ways it is true. However,  it misses a vital part of the picture.

Moldova and Transnistria can do more together than the "great powers" can ever hope to achieve. Ultimately, it is up to you to lay the foundations for a sustainable settlement, one that would suit both sides and where no one would felt cheated or left behind. I am convinced that each and every one of you in this room you have a key role to play in shaping that reality, and nothing can change this simple fact. But to do that, you need understanding and willingness to take the other side's views and concern into account. We hope that the Transnistrian dialogues have made a modest contribution to your understanding of each other, the tasks that you are faced with and the road that you will need to travel. No settlement can be sustainable without that.

Thank you

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