All About Latvia

Interesting Russia Today video:

Estonian TV

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The events in Tallinn are not so much about history. It’s not about the dead soldiers. It’s not about Estonia’s occupation, even.

It’s about symbolism.

It’s impossible not to comment the removal of the Red Army monument from downtown Tallinn. One can certainly understand why the Estonian government made the decision to move forward the time of the removal of the controversial monument of the Bronze Soldier at a 3 a.m. meeting Friday morning.

Controversy surrounding the monument is nothing new in post Soviet Estonia. It was built in 1947 as a symbol for what Russians still call Estonian liberation from the Nazi occupation. Some Estonians, though, believe this monument is a symbol of Soviet occupation. They allege that the Red Army soldiers died not fighting the Nazis, but rather fighting those who supported a new Estonian government formed during a few days following the Nazi withdrawal.

Last night, “some 1,500 people, mostly local Russians, some of them mobilized by the Nochnoy Dozor (Night Watch) red-brown group, had gathered around the Bronze Soldier in the pre-midnight hours. Some tried unsuccessfully to break through police lines, while most of them rampaged on shopping and residential streets downtown. The rioting received a second wind after the looting of liquor from bars on Tatari Street. Scores were injured, many of them by glass from vandalized shops. One death was reported in a stabbing incident. Thirteen policemen received injuries requiring hospitalization. Some 300 rioters were arrested throughout the night.”

Estonian President Toomas Hendrik Ilves called rioters “criminals.

“All this had nothing to do with the inviolability of graves or keeping alive the memory of men fallen in World War II,” Ilves said.

And he is right. Nor do I think the Parliament’s decision to remove the monument and the remains of the fallen soldiers is an attempt to preserve history. It’s a symbolic gesture that really doesn’t accomplish anything 16 years since Estonia declared its independence from the Soviet Union.

Russian official reaction was not as swift as one would have expected. Foreign Minister Igor Lavrov answering a question from the media in Oslo, said, “I believe that all this is disgusting. Although I have not seen any footage yet, I have heard what is happening there. There can be no justification for this blasphemy. It will have serious consequences for our relations with Estonia. It cannot but affect relations with the EU and NATO eventually – organizations which have admitted into their fold a country grossly violating the values on which the European Union and indeed European culture and democracy rest.”

I think Lavrov finds the removal of the monument disgusting, rather than a civil disorder on the streets of downtown Tallinn.

Latvian embassy in Tallinn is located near the epicenter of the events. In a press release Friday, Latvia’s Foreign Ministry avoided to opine on the Estonian government’s decision to remove the monument, but condemned the violence.

“In a democratic country, any group of society which disagrees with government decisions is free to express its own opinion, however, it must not violate the law. Acts of vandalism which pose a threat to the life and health of people and damage and destroy property have nothing in common with the democratic forms of protest.”

“The acts of vandalism in Tallinn left one diplomatic representative of the Latvian Embassy injured, and damage was also done to the embassy building. The Foreign Ministry considers that the organizers and perpetrators of said campaigns must be held liable.”

At the Estonian embassy in Riga, about three dozen (mostly Russian) people gathered to protest the removal of the monument.

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The number of signatures collected for the referendum reaches more than 110,000 out of approximately 150,000 signatures needed to hold a referendum on two national security laws. Some experts suggest that it will not be a referendum on those laws, but rather a referendum on the government policies in general. The last day to sign up is May 2.

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I often write about some Brits coming over to Latvia to wreck a havoc, but in this piece of news, I’d be interested to find out whether it was related to the victim being a Latvian, or did he just happen to be a Latvian who was killed.

From Leeds Today News:

DETECTIVES probing the murder of a supermarket worker in Leeds today issued the descriptions of two men and two women sought in connection with the attack.
Det Supt Paul Taylor of the West Yorkshire Homicide and Major Enquiry team was speaking hours after 23-year-old Artjoms Andrejevs died in Leeds Infirmary after being attacked at the Total garage on Tong Road, Wortley, Leeds, at 2am on Sunday.
The senior dectective appealed for help in finding two white men, both aged in their late teens or early 20s who were dressed in casual clothes, probably jeans.
They were in the company of two white women of a simlar age.
One of these women had long dark hair tied up at the back and wore a white T-shirt top with a design hole at the back.
The four people are believed to have been using a white Renault Megane car which has been seized by police since the attack on Mr Andrejevs.
Mr Andrejevs brother had been attempting to get an emergency flight from Latvia to reach the Leeds bedside of his dying bother but was unable to reach England before he passed away. He is now expected to arrive on Friday.
Speaking at the garage where Mr Andrejevs was attacked, Det Supt Taylor said: “This was a young man in the right place at the right time who did nothing wrong whatsoever.
“Sadly he met the wrong people and it is these people we now need to catch urgently. He was a hard working young man who came to this country to make a better life, he was in full time employment and his murder is an absolute tragedy.”

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