After a decade of free market reform, the death rate from tuberculosis in Moldova, formerly the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic, has quadrupled, while the gross national product has contracted by 60 per cent. At least a quarter of the population has fled the country.
Pensions are a thing of the past.
The country's principal export is prostitutes, while the trade in human kidneys is fast developing, as is the purchase of Moldovan children for adoption by credit card over the internet. In the circumstances, it is not altogether surprising that more than 50 per cent of Moldova's remaining population voted communist in last week's elections. Needless to say, a restoration will not be possible, but most people need to dream of something. Western diplomats have done very well out of the collapse. There is a strong market for visas to western countries.