Context: On June 3, 2026, the official account of the Cypriot Presidency of the Council of the European Union published a post stating that the EU was ready to begin discussing the specific terms of Moldova’s accession to the European Union. On May 26, a week earlier, Igor Dodon — the former president of Moldova and leader of the Socialist Party — arrived in Minsk to attend a conference and met with Aleksandr Lukashenko. Dodon claimed that most Moldovan citizens would prefer that their country pursue policies similar to those of Belarus.
In a May 31, 2026 interview on the program Glavnyi efir on the First Information Channel, Moldovan politician Igor Dodon, an advocate for strengthening the strategic partnership with Russia, stated that most Moldovan citizens trust Aleksandr Lukashenko.
“It is no coincidence that, in the latest poll a month ago, a majority of Moldovan citizens said that of all foreign politicians, the one they trust most — number one — is Lukashenko.”
The IMAS survey was conducted in February, not a month earlier. The Russian news agency TASS reported on the high level of trust Moldovan citizens have in Vladimir Putin and Aleksandr Lukashenko. It cited specific figures: 53% for Lukashenko and 52% for Putin. Some Belarusian media outlets also picked up this information. However, the research report shows that the figures cited by TASS, as well as Dodon’s statement, do not align with the poll results.
Respondents were asked: “How much do you trust the following leaders?” The answer options in Romanian can be translated as “trust very much,” “trust,” “do not trust much,” and “do not trust at all.” The first two options clearly indicate trust. They were selected by 30% of respondents in the case of Putin and 34% in the case of Lukashenko. That is nowhere near the more-than-50% figure claimed by TASS.
A result above 50% can only be obtained by adding the “do not trust much” responses to the positive ones. In Romanian, this response option is phrased as puțină. TASS likely concluded that some trust is better than none and included this response in the positive rating. However, in sociology, the response “don’t trust much” is classified as negative. Another survey conducted in Moldova in 2024, the results of which were also published by the Belarusian media, also demonstrates this. In it, the responses were categorized along a trust-distrust scale, and the option “puțină” fell into the negative category.
During the presentation of the results, IMAS Director General Doru Petruți cited figures other than those reported by TASS.
“Lukashenko and Russian President Vladimir Putin lead the trust ranking among international leaders by a wide margin, with trust ratings of 34% and 30%, respectively.”
Thus, with 34% of trust, he ranks first among foreign politicians, but he does not amount to the majority opinion of Moldovan citizens. The First Information Channel, Igor Dodon, and the TASS news agency overstated the popularity of Lukashenko and Putin by including among their supporters those who said they had little trust in them.