Moldovan President Maia Sandu has claimed that her country's accession to the European Union is the "only" way that it can "save its democracy."
Sandu expressed her hopes that the eastern European country will be able to join the bloc "as soon as possible" to protect itself against Russia.
"We believe that we can only save our democracy by being part of the EU," Sandu said in an interview with AFP published on Thursday.
"We do believe that Russia will continue to be a big source of instability for the years to come and we need to protect ourselves," the 50-year-old added.
Together with Ukraine, Moldova was officially granted EU candidate status in June last year, a major step on the path towards full membership. Last month, Sandu called for a major pro-European rally to be held in Chisinau, the country's capital, on 21 May.
'It's clear what the free world means'
During the interview, Sandu - who was elected president in 2020 - also vehemently condemned Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and suggested that her country would not seek to maintain relations with Moscow until it withdraws its forces from the country.
"What kind of relations can you have with a regime which kills innocent people in the neighbouring country?" Sandu asked. She added that Moldova was only prepared to engage with "democratic countries, with countries which respect the territorial integrity of other countries, which respect the international rules-based system."
"The Ukraine war made things black and white. So it's very clear what the free world means, and what the authoritarian world means, for all of us," she said.
In addition to bordering Ukraine to the east and Romania - an EU Member State - to the west, Moldova has a thousand Russian troops occupying the eastern breakaway region of Transnistria, when Russia intervened in the 1992 war in support of pro-Russian separatists.
The government sustains that the presence of Russian troops in Moldova is illegitimate and has called for their withdrawal and replacement by international forces.
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Relations between Chisinau and Moscow have also worsened significantly in recent months.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has claimed that Moldova "is one of the countries that the West wants to turn into another anti-Russia", and alleged that its President "is itching to join NATO" by anti-democratic means.
In February, Sandu accused Russia of attempting to foment a coup in her country, while former Prime Minister Natalia Gavrilița has alleged that "pro-Russian forces" are conducting a "hybrid war" against Moldova by stoking mass public protests, launching cyber attacks, and wielding bomb threats.
"We are seeing pro-Russian forces trying to destabilise the country politically through paid protests," Gavrilița said. "We are seeing cyber attacks. We've had the biggest cyber attacks in 2022 in the history of our country, and we are seeing bomb threats."
