10 Roubles Russian Sturgeon

Transnistria — the narrow strip of land between the Dniester River and the Ukrainian border that declared independence from Moldova in 1990 but remains unrecognized by any UN member state — issues its own coinage through the Transnistrian Republican Bank as an assertion of statehood. The sturgeon series sits within a broader program of wildlife commemoratives that the bank has used to generate hard-currency numismatic revenue, since the coins have no meaningful circulation economy behind them.

The beluga and Russian sturgeon populations in the Dniester had already collapsed significantly by 2008 due to Soviet-era industrial damming and post-Soviet poaching pressure.