The shop used to sell flowers and gardening tools to visitors from down the road, where the small region of Moldova has been defiantly divided for more than 30 years, backed by the Russian military.
However, since the gas cut in Russia on New Year’s Day, the store has been selling electric heaters to freezing residents of Transnistria, a self-proclaimed microstate in eastern Moldova.
Cheaper models are already sold out, the seller said, but high-end heaters are selling fast, as Transnistria’s 350,000 residents endure an energy crisis that has shut down factories, left Soviet-era apartments without heating and hot water and raised questions. about the survival of their only, Russian-speaking place.
The situation is so bad that the president of this region, Vadim Krasnoselsky – who leads an organization that is not recognized by all other countries, including Russia – tried to strengthen his people on Thursday: “We will not allow the collapse of society.”
“It’s difficult,” said Mr. Krasnoselsky, counting thousands of businesses, schools, farms and houses that were struggling without heat. The villagers had shown “a lot of responsibility,” he said, by “going out into the forest to collect dead wood” to burn at home.
The problem started on Jan. 1, when Russian energy giant Gazprom stopped pumping natural gas through Ukraine, its main remaining export route to Europe, after Ukraine refused to renew a five-year gas transit agreement.
In many places once dependent on Russian gas, such as Hungary, the effects of the shutdown softened other suppliers from the West. But Transnistria, a small part of the territory built on unwavering loyalty to Russia, faces an existential crisis.
Dorin Recean, the prime minister of Moldova, who has long called for the region to stop the regime’s accusations, accused Russia of creating “an impending humanitarian crisis.”
“By jeopardizing the future of the protectorate that has supported for thirty years in an effort to reduce Moldova, Russia presents the inevitable result for all its allies – betrayal and isolation,” said Mr. Recean on Friday.
Distracted by the war in Ukraine and increasingly wary of investment resources, Russia has shown a greater willingness recently to cut its losses, particularly in Syria, where it stood aside last month as rebels overthrew an alliance close to Moscow in the Middle East.
Alexandru Flenchea, the former deputy prime minister of Moldova who was responsible for trying to reunify Transnistria, said that Russia is not ready to leave the region, citing its use of military and political pressure on Moldova.
Russia’s desire to gain power, said Mr. Flenchea, we got a big boost in October when Moldovan voters narrowly approved a constitutional amendment to block the country’s exit from Moscow’s sphere of influence, aligning itself more with the West.
But, Mr. Flenchea added, Russia’s readiness to let Transnistria freeze without gas or its main source of income – the sale of electricity to Moldova from a hydroelectric station – suggests that the region was in deep trouble.
“The whole model in Transnistria depends on free Russian electricity. There is no free electricity in Russia, everything is falling,” he said. “But I don’t think Russia will allow this to happen soon. It still needs them.”
Others see the trauma of Transnistria less as a sign of Russia’s backsliding than its determination to divert Moldova from its pro-European path.
Also cut off from Russian electricity, Moldova last week switched to more expensive alternatives, including electricity from Romania. This saved Moldova from the cold but doubled the price of electricity for consumers, which could carry a huge political price for the pro-Western government in this year’s elections.
Russia’s goal, said Vladislav Kulminski, a former government official who is now with the Institute for Strategic Initiatives, a Moldovan think tank, “is to keep us in the dark by getting an election result that will bring a different government.”
“Everything is thrown into the air,” he said. “We don’t know what it will be like when all the pieces fall to the ground.”
A retro police state with its own currency and passports – and a successful football club sponsored by local oligarchs – Transnistria has an extensive security operation, reinforced by the Russians, and has worked hard to control what people hear.
Transnistrian media, echoing Russian talking points, blamed Ukraine, the United States and the Moldovan government for the gas cut. Rumors that Russian President Vladimir V. Putin may also be guilty are unheard of.
It seems the media blitz is working.
“Putin will never abandon us,” said Grigory Kravatenko, a resident of Bender, an industrial town on the border with Moldovan-controlled territory.
Asked whether Transnistria might be better off if it did not align with Moscow, he added: “We are not in Russia.” We are not in Moldova. We are not in Ukraine. We do it for ourselves and we all suffer.”
The cooking stoves continued to operate for a while after the Jan. shutdown. 1, because of the gas that was still in the pipes. But now they are also spending.
A resident of Transnistria who only gave her name, Yulia, walking on Friday with her infant daughter on the disused railway line, said she is sure that Russia will help them soon. “Yes, they won’t let us die,” he said.
Victor Ceban, an Orthodox Christian priest in charge of the concessions along the jagged border, said he avoided talking about who is in charge. “Whatever you say to one person becomes the enemy of another,” he said.
In some places, the border is marked by concrete barriers that the Russians are tirelessly manning. But it is so unclear in some places that it is easy to get lost in Transnistria. Waved at a checkpoint last week by a soldier with a Russian flag over his shoulder, journalists asked people at a bus stop if they were aware of the problems in Transnistria.
“Yes, of course. This is Transnistria,” said the old woman.
Mr. Ceban, a priest, walking from house to house on Friday through the Moldovan-controlled village of Varnita, gave blessings before Orthodox Christmas and prayed that his large flock would not suffer for long without heat.
When Transnistria, the most prosperous part of Moldova when both were part of the Soviet Union, broke away to form a breakaway state in the early 1990s, the region boasted that it would become a Russian-speaking version of Switzerland—a proudly independent state. the turmoil that hit Moldova, which was very poor.
The rebel region has become a symbol of what has since been Russia’s drive to maintain its influence in former Soviet states by supporting separatists: first in Moldova, then in Georgia and eastern Ukraine. In all three countries, local militias backed by Russian muscle have declared their own microstates.
The deployment of Russian troops to Transnistria, initially as peacekeepers but still present decades after the ceasefire, ensured that Moldova would not retake the territory through force and negotiation efforts.
Most important to Transnistria’s life, however, has been Russian gas, which has been supplied free of charge to keep the steel industry and other industries running – and to power a power plant that sells electricity to Moldova.
The Secretary of Energy of Moldova, Constantin Borosan, said that, before the current crisis, the electricity generated in Transnistria met about three-quarters of his country’s needs and provided almost half of the autonomous region’s budget.
“These people live on subsidized gas from Russia,” he said. “Now it looks like Russia has abandoned them.” He noted that Gazprom had ignored suggestions from Moldova that, using an alternative export route under the Black Sea, it could still get gas from Transnistria – if the Kremlin wanted it.
“I don’t know what’s going on in Putin’s head,” he said.
Regardless of Russia’s intentions, it is causing widespread pain not only in Transnistria, but also for residents of the territory controlled by Moldova.
Alexandru Nichitenco, the mayor of Varnita, a town surrounded by Transnistria and dependent on its own energy, said most of its 5,100 residents could no longer heat their homes. They face a crisis, he said, especially when normal winter temperatures — often several degrees below freezing — grip the country.
He said he did not blame Transnistria: “There is nothing they can do.” Moscow controls everything there. “
Veronica Ostap, a mother from Varnita who is struggling to feed her family without a working stove, said she is waiting for her salary next week to buy an electric kettle. He heated one room with an electric heater so that his three boys could sleep.
A Baptist Christian, he thanked God for keeping the temperature at zero, at least during the day. “The Lord is trying to help us,” he said.
Ruxanda Spatari contributed reporting from Chisinau, Moldova, and Natalia Vasilyeva from Berlin.
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