Russia said it had summoned the Moldovan ambassador in Moscow to the Foreign Ministry in protest against what the Russian Foreign Ministry called “unfounded accusations“ against the Russian ambassador in Chisinau by a Moldovan political party, BTA reported.
The Foreign Ministry said that the unnamed political party in Moldova had called for the Russian ambassador to be expelled and for the work of the Russian embassy to be limited.
Moldovan Prime Minister Dorin Recan said, however, that the summoning of the Moldovan ambassador to the Russian Foreign Ministry was related to the leak of a letter from the Russian embassy to the Moldovan authorities in connection with the energy crisis that has gripped the separatist region of Transnistria in Moldova. Recan told reporters that the letter said no Russian company would supply gas to the region, which has been suffering from power outages and heating outages in the winter after Ukraine refused to extend the transit of Russian gas to the region.
Moldovan President Maia Sandu told her Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky on Saturday that Russia had orchestrated the energy crisis in her country with the intention of bringing a pro-Russian government to power in Moldova. Russia denies any interference in Moldova's internal affairs.