30 July, 2017
"We perceive such actions of Moldovan authorities on the eve of the visit of Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, who is arriving in Moldova today on invitation of President Igor Dodon, as an unfriendly, provocative step aimed at derailing our bilateral relations", the embassy said. The plane landed in Minsk, after which the deputy prime minister flew to Moscow from the Belarusian capital by Aeroflot. Bucharest said Rogozin was on an European Union sanctions list imposed after Moscow's illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014.
Mr Rogozin told the Interfax news agency that he started using commercial flights after Romanian authorities closed their airspace to his chartered flight in 2014.
He is under attack for his role in the Russian annexation of Crimea in March 2014.
He later tweeted: "Expect a response, scoundrels!"
Located in the very East of Moldova, bordering Ukraine, the ethnically-Russian region separated from the country in the early 1990s.
Moldova's Constitutional Court has ruled that a referendum that planned to ask voters whether the country's pro-Russian president should have greater powers is unconstitutional.
Earlier this month, Moldovan legislators issued a fresh demand for Russian Federation to pull out troops stationed in the breakaway territory of Transdniestr since a ceasefire deal halted a bitter conflict 25 years ago.
In May, Chisinau kicked out five Russian diplomats which saw Moscow turf out its officials in revenge.
