Unable or unwilling? If they’re unable, then someone should enable them. If they’re unwilling, it seems, it’s their own problem and no one else’s. And it’s the question of who’s more unwilling: the title nation or the minority…

But seriously, the ‘s’ word — segregation — is intriguing. I hear often from critics of Estonia’s policies that it is trying to ‘assimilate’ the Russian minority rather than ‘integrate’ them.

But when I think about what some human rights organizations are advocating — basically a dual world within Estonia where schools, companies, and local governments function in Russian and serve only Russian speakers — then that reminds me of the good old Plessy vs. Ferguson days in the US — “separate but equal”.

You know as well as I do that when there is a majority, like in Estonia, that holds the money and the power, things will never be separate but equal. They will be separate and unequal, opening up Estonia to a whole new spectrum of international criticism.

One could argue that the current system, with its Soviet institutional leftovers, is inherently unequal and biased towards the Estonians. The Estonian schools have reformed. Have the Narva schools?

But if the government tries to tamper with those institutions, then they are engaged in a policy of ‘assimilation’. Let me ask anyone out there this, if Russian speakers are unable to express their opinion to the other 70 percent of the population, then aren’t they at a disadvantage and less powerful in society?