opportunity to effect change through different means. Smirnov won two seats in the elections of February 1990, the 32nd district seat for the city soviet (municipal government) of Tiraspol and the 125th district seat for the Supreme Soviet of MSSR (republican government) in the 1990 Moldovan parliamentary election. Once in the city soviet, Smirnov ran for chairmanship of that body. In a dramatic demonstration of how much the Communist Party's power had waned, Smirnov beat his challenger, the First Secretary of the city's Party Committee, Leonid Tsurkan, by a 2-to-1 margin. From this time forward, Tiraspol was an OSTK-controlled city. Things did not go quite as smoothly for Igor Smirnov in the Moldovan Supreme Soviet. The OSTK candidates, mostly from Transnistria in the country's eastern periphery, were a small fraction of the body's overall membership—approximately 15 percent. In May 1990, these Transnistrian Supreme Soviet deputies were attacked and beaten by pro-independence protesters and quickly left the body for their homes in the East. Unable to affect the course of events in Chişinău, these deputies acted to establish their own Soviet republic, a republic that would remain a part of the Soviet Union and not secede with the rest of the Moldova. Many Moldovans reacted with outrage at this infringement of their sovereignty and the Soviet central government publicly rebuked the separatists for making the situation worse and pushing Moldova further toward independence. Proclamation of independence Igor Smirnov emerged as a leader of the OSTK on a regional level as Transnistrian politicians and activists worked towards sovereignty from the Moldovan SSR in the summer and autumn of 1990. When the First All-region Congress of Transnistrian Deputies created a self-contained Transnistrian economic zone in June 1990, Smirnov was elected chair of a coordinating council charged with carrying momentum forward to sovereignty. A second congress held on September 2 proclaimed the creation of the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic (PMSSR) and deputies elected him to chair the Provisional Supreme Soviet of the PMSSR. In his new role as chairman of the PMSSR Supreme Soviet, and later, president of the Pridnestrovian Moldovan Republic (PMR), Smirnov worked to gain recognition for the state. While this was never a likely outcome, Smirnov was successful at securing the cooperation of a locally stationed Red Army unit; as the conflict grew increasingly violent at the end of 1991 and into 1992, Red Army leaders and enlisted men, often