A renegade part of Moldova once boasted it would become a Russian-speaking Switzerland. Now without gas, its leader assured residents, “We will not allow a societal collapse.”

The head of Moldova’s breakaway region Transnistria has urged residents to burn firewood for heating and warned that blackouts cannot be avoided, after Moscow stopped supplying gas via Ukraine.

The separatist Moldovan region of Transnistria has stopped heating and hot water supply to households after the cessation of gas transit through Ukraine.The

Moldova’s Transnistria region has been thrust into an energy crisis following the termination of a gas transit agreement between Russia and Ukraine.

Moscow breakaway region of Transnistria halted almost all industrial activity except for food production, following the end of Russian gas flows through Ukraine, Interfax reported.

Vadim Krasnoselsky, the leader of the unrecognised republic of Transnistria in Moldova, has said that there are "no hopeless situations" and called for heating with firewood amid the loss of gas and heating in the homes of thousands of people in Transnistria.