The prime minister of Moldova says the poor eastern European nation needs major international support to cope with the influx of people fleeing neighboring Ukraine.

Natalia Gavrilita told a donor conference in Berlin on Tuesday that Moldova is hosting about 100,000 refugees from Ukraine, about a quarter of those who have entered since late February.

About 15,000 of the refugees who flooded Moldova are Jews who have been devotedly cared for by the Jewish kehilla in Kishinev, headed by Chief Rabbi HaRav Pinchas Saltzman. At one point, HaRav Saltzman had to tell kehilla members to daven at home on Shabbos since the shul had been converted into a refugee center, with mattresses covering the floor.

Gavrilita said Moldova, with a population of 2.5 million, has tried to provide refugees with decent conditions thanks to an “unprecedented mobilization” by the public and private sectors.

But she said “coping with this influx is one of the biggest challenges any Moldovan government has faced over the last three decades.”

She said that in addition to financial aid, Moldova also needs help building electricity interconnectors to Romania. She asked the European Union to open its market to agricultural imports from her country as it pivots away from Russia.

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem & AP)