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VILNIUS, November 2, 2011 (AFP) - OSCE chair Lithuania on Wednesday hailed the release by Transdniestr of Ilya Kazak, jailed for 14 years in February on charges of spying for Moldova, in a case rights monitors said was flawed.

Lithuanian Foreign Minister Audronius Azubalis said in a statement he was "relieved" to learn that Kazak had been set free on October 31.

"The OSCE has closely monitored the situation and has worked actively through diplomatic channels to facilitate his release," said Azubalis, whose country is currently at the helm of the 56-nation Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

Kazak, a tax official from the Transdniestrian city of Bendery, was detained in March 2010 on charges of treason and spying for Moldova.

In February this year, a court sentenced him to 14 years in prison following a trial rights monitors and the European Union said was unfair.

Azubalis said that he hoped the step would add new momentum to a relaunch of negotiations for a permanent settlement to ex-Soviet Moldova and breakaway Transdniestr's two-decade conflict.

At a meeting in Moscow in September, Moldova and Transdniestr agreed to hold talks -- potentially before the end of this year, in Lithuania.

The so-called "5+2" negotiations -- involving Moldova, Transdniestr, Russia, Ukraine and the OSCE, plus the EU and United States as observers -- were suspended in 2006.

Transdniestr, a predominantly Russian-speaking region with around 500,000 residents, unilaterally declared independence from Moldova in 1991 as the latter split from the Soviet Union.

It engaged in an armed conflict with the mainly Romanian-speaking Moldovans in 1992 which cost some 700 lives.

Moldova has refused to renounce its sovereignty over Transdniestr, making settling the conflict crucial to its drive to join the EU, which has solid backing from Lithuania and other ex-communist members of the bloc.