In Moldova, about half of the marriages end in divorce, according to the statistics for the last two years furnished by the Civil Status Service to Info-Prim Neo. Civil Status Service senior specialist Natalia Cristian said that 17,800 marriages had been registered in the first nine months of last year. The number of divorces in the period was 7,700. Most of the couples divorce during the first five years of the marriage. The highest number of divorces is recorded among couples aged between 30 and 34 – about 20% of the total number of divorces. According to the data of the Civil Status Service, the number of marriages involving foreigners remained at practically the same level as in 2011. There were created about 2,000 such new families, mainly with citizens of Ukraine, Turkey, Russia, Romania, and Israel. The average age of the persons who get married in Moldova is 23 in the case of women and 26 in the case of men.