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 />
August 23, 1988. Hirvepark (Deer Park) in the centre of Tallinn became the cradle<br />
of the <strong>Estonia</strong>n democratic citizen’s initiative. The first Hirvepark demonstration took<br />
place in 1987 on the anniversary of the criminal deal between Nazi and Communist<br />
dictators that sealed the fate of the Baltic countries in 1939 – the Molotov-<br />
Ribbentrop Pact. Many thousands of demonstrators demanded the truth – the<br />
publication of the secret protocols of the infamous Pact. From then on people<br />
gathered at the same place every year on August 23 th<br />
(Tunne Kelam)<br />
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