Vladimir Putin is being urged to test the West once again, with separatists thought to be ready to ask him to annex a disputed region of Moldova.
The apparent plot was revealed by Gennady Chorba, a politician in Transnistria, which borders Ukraine. Mr Chorba was quoted by local media as saying the region’s rebel government would lodge its request during a special congress, which last met in 2006.
He said: “This will be voiced to Russia on behalf of citizens living on the left bank of the Dniester River.”
His remarks followed days after Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, called for the rights of pro-Russian separatists in Transnistria to be respected.
The US-based Institute for the Study of War has accused Putin of trying to stoke tensions in Transnistria to create an “imminent political crisis” in the country, which is a former Soviet state which is bidding to join the European Union.
Russia keeps roughly 2,000 soldiers in Transnistria, and after Putin’s invasion of Ukraine two years ago, there were concerns the Kremlin could use the nation to open up a second front.
Ukraine has stationed machine guns along its border with the region.
One insider, speaking on condition of anonymity, told The Telegraph Putin likely saw the region and two other pro-Russia rebel states in Georgia as tools in its “hybrid warfare” campaign against Europe, along with directing migrants into the EU.
They said: “Somebody may have ordered this to provoke tensions, to provoke reactions, and it’s worked.”
Referring to the country’s capital, Alexandru Flenchea, Moldova’s former deputy prime minister, said: “This is a provocation to test reactions in Chisinau, test reactions in Kyiv and also in Moscow.
“The Moldovan government said that there was no indication that this was going to happen, but the public reaction… there was a lot of panic.”
Western capitals are monitoring the situation around Transnistria, which has a population of about 400,000, particularly given the Kremlin is understood to see Moldova as a European weak point.
Transnistria runs its own affairs after splitting with Moldova after a war in the 1990s, but remains economically connected.
Russia sponsors Transnistria by providing it with free gas and paying pensions, and also controls its security services.
Russian is spoken in Tiraspol, which is the Transnistrian capital.
