Short answers, pulled from the story.
Moldova is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe, bordered by Romania to the west and Ukraine to the north, east, and south. It has an area of 33,843 square kilometres and lies east of the Carpathian Mountains, separated from Romania by the Prut river and from Ukraine by the Dniester river.
Moldova is the poorest country in Europe by GDP per capita, with much of its GDP dominated by the service sector. It has one of the lowest Human Development Indexes in Europe, ranking 86th in the world in 2023, and remains highly dependent on remittances from workers abroad, which make up about 25 percent of GDP.
Transnistria is an unrecognised breakaway state on the east bank of the Dniester river, which has been under the de facto control of its own breakaway government since 1990. The Transnistria War in 1992 left it as a de facto independent state, and more than a thousand Russian soldiers remain stationed there.
Moldova was officially granted EU candidate status in June 2022, and formal accession talks began on the 13th of December 2023. The country has set 2030 as its target date for accession, and a 2024 referendum on joining the EU passed narrowly with 50.17% voting yes.
Maia Sandu is the president of Moldova, first elected in 2020 on a pro-Western and anti-corruption ticket, becoming the first female elected president of Moldova. She was re-elected in November 2024 with 55% of the vote in the run-off.
Moldova has 122,000 hectares of vineyards and ranks among the 20 largest wine producers in the world, with the wine industry making up three percent of GDP and eight percent of total exports. It is home to Mileștii Mici, the largest wine cellar in the world, which has held the Guinness World Record for largest wine cellar by number of bottles since 2005.
The only official language of Moldova is Romanian, a Romance language, though approximately 15% of the population also speak Russian. There remains a controversy over whether Moldovan and Romanian should be considered distinct languages, with the government rejecting any distinction.