So, the Pronkssõdur Statue is gone. Or moved. Riots hopefully fading in Tallinn, leaving many angry drunkards in jail, some of them probably without an idea why they were locked up in cells in the first place. One person dead. That's sad.
*******
These beautiful photos of the Finnish countryside are just referring to how we spent our (very short) holiday before May Day. In our datcha, of course (– and I am not referring to the sort of datcha I have mentioned before)!
But. I was furious for not being able to get news from the internet (did not have any sort of connection in the countryside.) Had many friends in Tallinn, of course, and on TV it looked... bad. (I hope you guys are ok.)
Better later than never, I have to add some strong words to the dispute over the Bronze Soldier (I have written about it earlier, too).
And now anti-Estonian reactions are boiling in Moscow, with a lot of drumming and all sorts of fireworks. Could it get even more ridiculous? (Probably.)
Please, all the wise Top Hats of powerful governments, please help the little Estonia! Russia is twisting the arguments so fallacious, in hair-raising way.
IStori being very compassionate now:
*** It does not matter what has been the original purpose of the statue. To the Estonians, during the past decades it has come to symbolise violent oppression. (Or so I have heard from various Estonian sources.) Should this be the case, then it is a miracle that this dominant, ugly statue has been able to occupy its central position for so long.
*** The Statue is in Tallinn, Estonia. Then it is up to the Estonians to decide what do with it. Not up to you, Russians, or to us, Finns, either (– but we Finns do not want to decide on anything! We just support you, our Southern brothers and sisters, and clap our hands)!
*** Yes, there is a huge Russian minority in Estonia. Right. But minority is a minority, and in democracy it is not enough. It's the majority that rules. (I am NOT referring to Bolsheviks, just drawing the basic lines of democracy!) The new, very respectful mesta for the Statue a little further from the center of Tallinn should be suitable for the (big) minority, anyway.
*** And, all of you/us outside Estonia, please do check out what it actually means to live in an occupied country. Occupied especially by the USSR. Deportations, anyone?
For example, in 1949 Operation Priboi was carried out, and then close to 100 000 people were deported from the Baltic states to the USSR, every third of them being a child.
"The deportation of Estonian people to Siberia started during the eve of June 14, 1941. 490 railway carriages were kept ready on branch lines. According to the lists made up in counties 11,102 people were to be deported from Estonia. -- Altogether over 10,000 people were deported from Estonia. Most grown-up men were declared arrested and were separated from their families. Their itinerary continued in overcrowded carriages through Narva and Irboska to Siberian death camps where most of them soon perished or were executed. By the spring of 1942 out of 3,500 men taken to these camps only a few hundred had survived. Women and children were sent to exile to Kirov and Novosibirsk oblasts. Hard work, hunger and exhaustion soon became fatal for half of them, and after the war 49% of those deported succeeded in returning home.
In March 1949 the next extensive deportation campaign was conducted in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. The Soviet authorities decided to deport forever 22,326 people from Estonia to the remotest areas of the USSR. The total number of innocent people intended to be deported from the Baltic States amounted to 100,000."
(The text was from the Tartu City Museum web pages. A good Latvian source on Operation Priboi is here.)
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