Originally Posted by Paul Errass

The problem unfortuantely is not that simple due to the fact that over 400,000 Russians or Estonians of Russian descent live in Estonia , a minority but still a lot of people.Until the Estonian government makes it easier for the Russian side to get Estonian citizenship unfortunately a lot of them are still going to look East to the Motherland for support which of course Russia is willing to give to stir up problems for the Estonian government.

The government were in a no win situation with the Bronze soldier and in the end probably had to take the descision they did and move it.It has been moved to a cemetery on the city outskirts which is a much better location.

Plus Estonians fought for the Russians as part of the 8th Estonian Rifle Corps so you now have veterans in Estonia who fought for the opposing sides who want to have their own memorials etc to their old comrades and despite reconcilaition the bottom line is that some old wounds in the WW2 and Soviet History of Estonia run deep.

Fascist and Communist are still words that are readily used as insults in Estonia.

It's a very complicated scenario i have Estonian friends both Estonian and Russian and they know that this is an issue that is not going to be easily solved.

This is also going on in the other Baltic States Latvia and Lithuania.

regards

Paul