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How similar are the Moldovan and Romanian languages?

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Moldovan and Romanian are not distinct languages; rather, Moldovan is a form of Dacoromanian, the same dialectal basis used for the standard Romanian language.

During the Soviet era, the language in Moldova was referred to as "Moldavian," written in the Cyrillic alphabet, and officially characterized by Soviet scholars as an independent language. However, since 1989, the language has been written in the Latin alphabet, and it is currently recognized as Romanian. Today, Moldova officially identifies its national language as Romanian.12