Objectives
The project’s purpose is to provide young Moldovan politicians and experts with the necessary background knowledge an opportunity for creating a military strategy based on the security concept that the Moldovan Parliament approved on May 8, 2008, and to share best practices of the NATO countries.

Background
Moldova is facing the challenge of transition and, at the same time, the threat of secession of a part of its territory, Transnistria. A powerful ally of the Transnistrian rulers, Russia, uses instruments of political, economic, and sometimes even military blackmail to convince Moldova to return under the Russian umbrella. While the OSCE and the EU have been involved in the negotiations aimed at the settlement of the conflict in Transnistria, Moldova was more focused on stabilizing and satisfying Russian demands than on solving the conflict. This led to the current approval of the National Security Concept, which declares that Moldova will not be a member of any military alliance and declared itself as a permanently neutral country. The method of the concept’s approval, the fact that the Communist Party did not give the opposition the chance to propose amendments, and the fact that the approved version significantly differs from the expert draft, which was introduced in public debates, question how much the National Security Concept can serve as the basis of a widely approved security strategy.

Project Description
The training concentrates on the skills and activities needed for close cooperation between NGOs, international organizations, and politicians during the drafting period of the strategy. The ICDT will work out a communications strategy and a “Plan for Public Debates” in order to incorporate the public opinion into the draft document. With its experts, the ICDT helps the participants to recognize and analyze the obstacles Moldova has to face and tries to provide them with a toolkit and an overview of practices. As Andrei Stratan, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs and European Integration of the Republic of Moldova, stated several times the Central European experience serves as a the model of the security sector reform concept, and the trainers should mainly represent these countries. The Centre believes that, as a result of the training, young politicians and NGO leaders can be convinced that the country can participate in peacekeeping and conflict prevention missions and stay neutral at the same time. Through the participants, the young population of the country can be reached and opinions shaped. The ICDT plans to widely distribute a textbook of the training and wants to provide as many Moldovan Universities as possible with it.