Celebrating a nation that doesn’t exist
By Sarah Reid
By the time the morning sun had crept above the city’s Soviet-era apartment blocks, the
crowd-control barriers lining Suvorov Square in downtown Tiraspol were already three-deep with
families dressed in their Sunday (in this case, Monday) best. Their collective excitement was
almost palpable on this surprisingly warm September day; anyone would have thought a royal
wedding was on the cards.
But in Transnistria (also spelled Trans-Dniester), a silver of land tracing Moldova’s border
with Ukraine for 400km, the capital’s Independence Day celebrations are the highlight of the
year. Never mind that the tiny Eastern European nation, formally called the Pridnestrovian
Moldavian Republic (PMR), doesn’t officially exist.
Unrecognised as a nation by any member of the United Nations despite declaring its
independence in 1990, a year before the Soviet Union crumbled, Transnistria is a wonderfully
peculiar place. Less than 70km south-east of the Moldovan capital of Chisinau, Tiraspol
(population: 130,000) is often described as being stuck in the USSR. Indeed, from the imperious
statue of Lenin guarding Transnistria’s Brutalist parliament building to its streets named after
Communist luminaries and significant dates, it’s certainly not short on Soviet-era relics.
1.What is Transnistria formally name?
