Pro-Western Moldovan President Maia Sandu's PAS party was leading snap parliamentary elections on Sunday, preliminary data from the central election commission showed, Reuters reported. The party based its campaign on a platform of fighting corruption and carrying out reforms.

Moldovan citizens will go to the polls on Sunday in a key snap parliamentary election that could decide whether the former Soviet republic fully embraces pro-Western reform or prolongs a political impasse with strong Russian influence, AP reported. The landlocked country of 3.5m, Europe's poorest, sandwiched between Romania and Ukraine has in recent years lurched from one political crisis to another, dogged by instability and stuck in geopolitical limbo between pro-Western and pro-Russia forces.

Moldova's recently-elected and pro-European President Maia Sandu on Wednesday dissolved parliament and scheduled fresh elections for July, bringing to a head a dispute with lawmakers loyal to her predecessor, AFP reported.

Moldovan President Maia Sandu announced on Tuesday she was nominating the leader of her parliamentary party, Igor Grosu, to be the ex-Soviet republic's next prime minister, Reuters reported. It is the second attempt by the pro-Western president to appoint a government since she won a presidential election in November against the incumbent Igor Dodon.

Moldova opposition candidate Maia Sandu, who favours closer ties with the EU, promised to unite the country and tackle corruption as she looked on course to beat pro-Moscow incumbent Igor Dodon in a presidential run-off on Sunday, Reuters reported.

The leader of the Action and Solidarity Party, Maia Sandu won the first round of the presidential election in Moldova on Sunday. The pro-European centre-right candidate came out on top with 36.1% of the vote, announced Moldova’s Central Electoral Commission on Monday morning, with 99.81% of the ballots counted.

Moldova’s parties on Saturday agreed to form a government and appoint Maia Sandu, a former education minister and World Bank adviser, as prime minister with a mandate to curb the power of oligarchs in one of Europe’s poorest countries, news wires reported. “Injustice has come to an end today in Moldova,” Sandu said. “Today begins the process of the purification of Moldova.”