I don’t think it was part of his grand plan.

Russia's "little green men" took it over 35 years ago.

It's too bad Ukraine couldn't open a front there - it's a territory that's almost impossible to defend.

It will create an excuse for Russia to declare war on Moldova (Russia has a defense pact with Transnistria which it recognizes as an independent state). Nor is Moldova likely to take back Transnistria by military force.

But as a political pushback against Russia’s imperial ambitions, the current developments in Moldova render the country increasingly unlikely to be wholly occupied by Russia, which was Putin’s plan all along.

I'd imagine they proposed it to Moldova and were asked to lay off.

Most of Transnistria is a strip of farmland along the Nistria River less than 5 miles wide.

Expect serious outbreaks of soreloserism from Russia and its fellow travellers in the Patriotic Bloc in the aftermath of the election. Its leader, Igor Dodon, claimed victory before even a significant proportion of the votes had been counted and is currently stage-managing a demonstration "to protect the victory" outside the electoral commission's offices, with more likely to follow tomorrow outside the Moldovian parliament.

On Twitter (and no doubt other social media) certain accounts have been circulating a laughably fake video showing an alleged election official sat at a desk, stuffing vote forms for the opposition parties into a metal waste can prior to burning them, calling those voters "idiots" and bemoaning how few votes there are for PAS.

We're supposed to believe that not only is an election official handling bundles of completed voting forms illicitly in a secluded room, but also videoing what he's doing and publishing it widely.

Most of the English-language versions have suspiciously similar wording, usually unsubtle variations on:

which will translate into around 55 parliamentary seats out of 101, a reduction from the previous election when it had 61 seats, but a clear majority over all the other parties combined, and a thrashing for the Patriotic Bloc, which looks set to win just 26 seats.

The Patriotic Bloc's leader Igor Dodon's demonstration in front of the parliament this morning to protest the results reportedly attracted around 300 people and fizzled out after about half an hour.

At a press conference this morning, MP Konstantin Starîș, leader of the Communist faction in the Patrotic Bloc, addressed journalists in Russian. When the journalists called for him to speak in Romanian, Dodon called out "No, let them learn Russian!"

This might be more of a surprise if the Patriotic Bloc's logo didn't look like this: