Europe

Moldovan minister refuses to take questions in Russian

Nation

12 August, 10:49 PM

Moldova's Defense Minister, Anatolie Nosatii, refused to answer a reporter who asked a question in Russian at a press conference on Aug. 12, local outlet NewsMaker reported.

Nosatii interrupted the question and, speaking Romanian, said, "I don't understand you." The reporter repeated the question in Romanian, and Nosatii said he would answer "with great pleasure," thanking her for speaking the state's language and saying she "speaks it very well."

NewsMaker noted that Nosatii's government biography lists knowledge of English and Russian in addition to his native Romanian. The biography also says he spent four years in military training in Ukraine in the 1990s.

In March 2023, Moldova's parliament approved a bill that replaced the terms "Moldovan language," "state language," "official language," "native language" and "our language" with "Romanian language" in all laws, including the constitution.

In October 2023, Romania's then-Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu, during a briefing with his Ukrainian counterpart in Kyiv, thanked Ukraine for abandoning the term "Moldovan language."

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