Russia on Tuesday denounced Moldova's weekend election as unfair and said it did not see the winner, Maia Sandu, as the legitimate president of the country. Pro-Western Sandu defeated a former prosecutor general backed by a traditionally pro-Russian party in a vote marred by allegations of election meddling by Moscow,

"She is not, as far as we understand, the president of her country because, in the country itself, the majority of the population did not vote for her," Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said.

Moldovan President Maia Sandu pulled out a decisive election victory in the former Soviet republic on Sunday, defying Russian efforts to disrupt the ballot and revive her push to steer the country into the European Union by the end of the decade.