Moldovan opposition demonstrated against Russian influence last week

US Secretary of State Colin Powell this week proposed deploying a multi-national buffer force in the region.

President Vladimir Voronin, who last week refused a Russian offer to keep its troops in Moldova until 2020, said the US idea must be pursued.

Russian-speaking Transdniester declared independence from Romanian-speaking Moldova in 1990.

Russian troops intervened in 1992 to stop the ensuing conflict and have since helped maintain an uneasy truce.

National protests

They pledged to leave by the end of last year, but extended the deadline for a year at the request of the Transdniester leadership.

Russian forces could still have a majority role in the international force. But, they would have to be placed under the auspices of the OSCE or the EU President Vladimir Voronin

Last month Russia suggested its troops could remain in a demilitarised, federal Moldovan state, and proposed a referendum on making Russian an official language.

The nationalist and centrist opposition in Moldova took to the streets in their thousands, protesting against what they saw as an attempt to turn the ex-Soviet state back into a Russian protectorate.

In the end, the communist President Voronin announced it was impossible for him to sign the Russian text.

He pointed out that it described Transdniester as a "distinct republic" which, he said, could lead to its official recognition.

The American-backed plan was announced by the US Secretary of State Colin Powell during an OSCE meeting in The Hague this week.

Mr Powell called on the OSCE to help form "a genuinely international" stabilisation force, limited in scope and duration, to ensure a Russian withdrawal and a permanent settlement.

Mr Powell said he found it regrettable that Russia looked unlikely to meet the new withdrawal deadline, which is the end of this year.

Strategic partner

President Voronin welcomed the offer on Wednesday, while arguing that Russian forces could still have a majority role in the international force.

"But they would have to be placed under the auspices of the OSCE or the EU," he said.

Mr Voronin acknowledged Russia as a "strategic partner" for Moldova, however he also stressed that Chisinau could not ignore the opinion of the EU, since it is a "fundamental vector of the country's foreign policy".