Estonia: Almost extinguished, successfully reborn
The following text is the shortest possible review to help inform friends and guests from abroad about Estonia’s experience with foreign occupation and totalitarianism as well as its road to peacefully re-establishing national inde-pendence on the basis of democracy. Tunne Kelam Member of the European Parliament
The following text is the shortest possible review to help inform friends and guests from abroad about Estonia’s experience with foreign occupation and totalitarianism as well as its road to peacefully re-establishing national inde-pendence on the basis of democracy.
Tunne Kelam
Member of the European Parliament
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ESTONIA:<br />
<strong>Almost</strong><br />
<strong>extinguished</strong>,<br />
<strong>successfully</strong><br />
<strong>reborn</strong><br />
aimed at merging the different peoples into a new historic<br />
Russian-speaking entity – the Soviet nation. In<br />
national “provinces” like <strong>Estonia</strong>, this meant an intensified<br />
campaign against the “vestiges of nationalism”<br />
and “provincial egotism” as well as enforced russification<br />
at the expense of local language and culture. The<br />
Communist authorities tried to introduce artificially<br />
new all-Union Soviet traditions in order to overcome<br />
“national introversion” as well as the still surviving<br />
religious customs. These measures, together with the<br />
Soviet invasion of Afghanistan (where in 1980s hundreds<br />
of <strong>Estonia</strong>n draftees were killed or crippled) rang an<br />
alarm bell as for the future of the <strong>Estonia</strong>n nation and<br />
its identity.<br />
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