30 Decembre 2025
Statement
The Academy, the spiritual force of the unity and identity of Romanians
Throughout the modern history of the Romanian space, academic institutions played an essential role in strengthening national identity, in establishing linguistic norms for Romanian and cultivating national history, and in shaping Romanian political unity.
The Romanian Academy, founded in 1866, was established as an institution of cultural unity, affirmed through language and history, and the presence, from the beginning, of three representatives of Bessarabia among its founding members confirms its integrative role and mission of ensuring the unity of the Romanian people.
Along with the Bessarabian Romanians, scholars and writers from all the historical Romanian provinces became members of the first core of the Romanian Academy, so that a unified cultural Romania was created in 1866-1867, long before the existence of politically united Romania in 1918. In other words, the Academy had from the beginning a vocation for the unity of Romanians.
In 2026, the Romanian Academy will celebrate 160 years of existence, an opportunity to reflect on a historical mission fulfilled with dignity: that of being the guardian of identity, through the Romanian language, culture and collective memory.
Throughout its existence, the Romanian Academy has been not only a scientific institution – the supreme forum of intellectual consecration and the privileged space of fundamental research – but also a true depository of the nation’s conscience, capable of transcending time and continuously supporting the truth.
The Academy of Sciences of Moldova, created in 1961, in a dramatic historical context, marked by the consequences of World War II and the forced placement of Bessarabia in the Soviet Union, had a complex and often very difficult mission. Despite the ideological constraints of the time, this institution succeeded in preserving, developing, and passing on to future generations the scientific and cultural tradition of the people inhabiting the eastern half of the old Romanian principality of Moldavia.
Today, despite the vicissitudes related to a nefarious propaganda, it is known all over the world that the identity of the people on both banks of the Prut is Romanian, and the two sister Academies have had and continue to have a fundamental role in defending this truth. Through rigorous research, reflected in prestigious academic publications, through scientific debates and through assumed public positions, they defend the essential values of the people: the Romanian language, history as it was, national culture and common future. Aware that the path to the political unity of the people, in the current geopolitical conditions, is a complicated one, the Romanian Academy and the Academy of Sciences of Moldova have opted for a strategy of sustainable rapprochement, based on institutional cooperation and joint actions. Three years ago, the two academies developed a Joint Action Plan, which aims to jointly mark national holidays – National Culture Day, Romanian Language Day – as well as other symbolic moments of the identity calendar. An eloquent example of this cooperation is the official declaration of 2025 as the “Mihai Eminescu Year”, at the joint initiative of the two academies. This gesture has not only a commemorative value, but also a symbolic one: Eminescu is the spiritual bond of Romanians everywhere, and his joint commitment represents a reaffirmation of the unity of language, culture and destiny.
At the same time, the election of personalities from both banks of the Prut as members of both academies reflects a recognition of the merits of each, but also the institutional will to build a common scientific and cultural space, in which administrative borders are effectively secondary in relation to our truth, value and unity. Science, by its nature, has no boundaries. In the Romanian space, culture also knows no borders, being Romanian on both banks of the Prut. In this context, the continuous rapprochement of the two academies is not a circumstantial act, but a natural process, a requirement of the time. This rapprochement is also organically part of the European path of the Republic of Moldova, which favors institutional harmonization, the opening of borders and the reconnection of artificially fragmented historical and cultural spaces.
In perspective, the de facto disappearance of the artificial border along the Prut is not just a political desideratum, but the result of a long process of spiritual, cultural and scientific reunification. In this process, the Romanian Academy and the Academy of Sciences of Moldova play the role of architects of sustainable unity, preparing the foundation on which, at the right historical moment, the political unification of all Romanians can also be achieved. Thus, through responsibility, continuity and fidelity to the truth, the two academies – the Romanian Academy and the Academy of Sciences of Moldova – reflect the old unity of the Romanian people and build the new one day by day, towards the victory of truth, towards the glory and spiritual prosperity of Romanians everywhere.
Academician Ioan-Aurel Pop, President of the Romanian Academy
Academician Ion Tighineanu, President of the Academy of Sciences of Moldova