Friday—December 13, 2002
COPENHAGEN (CITY PAPER) Baltic leaders heralded their invitations to join the European Union as fulfillment of what once seemed an impossible dream—while others say they’re not convinced membership is such a wonderful prospect. “Mr. Repse is in Copenhagen drinking champagne and I am here in Riga drinking Cognac—need I say more?” Peteris Vinkelis, a gleeful advisor to Latvian Prime Minister Einars Repse told Reuters after the invitations were extended Friday in the Danish capital.
After complicated talks in Copenhagen—negotiations that at times looked like they might fail—the EU finally asked the three Baltic states and seven other candidate nations to join in May, 2004. The admittance of the 10 news members will make the 25-member EU the largest single trade bloc in the world, with a population of over 450 million and a GDP of some 10 trillion dollars—about equal to the U.S. GDP. Leaders agreed to pay some 42 billion dollars in aid to the newcomers over three years. “Today marks an unprecedented and historic milestone,” said a joint communiqué from leaders of the current 15 members. “This achievement testifies to the common determination of the people’s of Europe to come together in a Union that has become the driving force for peace democracy, stability and prosperity on our continent.”
Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania only managed to shake off communism in 1991, two years after the rest of eastern Europe, and their economies were in worse shape—so they were seen as long shots at the start of the race into the EU. But the Baltics wasted little time adopting market reforms after regaining independence during the Soviet collapse, and their economic performances soon surpassed many of those those that won freedom earlier. With a combined population of just over 7 million, the Baltics are also smaller morsels for the EU to swallow—compared to Poland, which, with its 40 million people, is likely to absorb huge chunks of the EU’s expansion budget.
Joyful EU supporters harkened back to the five dark decades under Soviet rule, when the Baltics seemed largely forgotten and appeared to have no hope of ever taking their seats as the European table as independent nations. Reflecting widespread EU enthusiasm among politicians, the city council in Vilnius announced Friday it would start renaming streets after EU- and NATO-member states to commemorate Lithuania’s Western integration
But not everyone’s celebrating.
EU skeptics liken the EU to the Soviet Union, saying it’s too bureaucratic and prone to bullying small nations. An anti-EU symbol here is a hammer and sickle amid EU stars; some graffiti spray painted along side streets reads “EU=USSR.” “It’s a sad day. EU membership will mean the complete loss of our sovereignty,” said Uno Silberg, who heads Estonia’s No to the EU Movement. Pro-EU officials scoff at the parallel: “It’s not the same,” Latvian Foreign Minister Sandra Kalnieteshe told the BBC. “We were occupied, incorporated (by the Soviet Union) and I would say it was a kind of rape. And now we are approaching a marriage of love. That will be the difference.”
The EU invitations come just weeks after the Baltics were also asked to enter the U.S.-led NATO alliance. EU and NATO entry were the two top foreign policy priorities after the Baltics broke free of Moscow’s grip. Trivimi Velliste, a former Estonian foreign minister, says the EU and NATO complement each other, one promising growth and the other security. “The EU is good life,” he said. “NATO is life.”
Many opened champagne to celebrate pending membership in NATO—seen as offering a protective wing for the Baltics to snuggle under. But reactions Friday among the average man and woman on the street seemed more subdued, with many still questioning the benefits of EU entry. Pro-EU Estonian legislator Toomas Ilves said qualifying for NATO—while challenging—wasn’t quite as painful as overhauling state institutions and adopting 80,000 pages of EU laws. Hence some of the grudges about the EU. “Joining NATO is like buying a very expensive suit of armor that you have to get in shape to be able to wear,” he said. “Joining the EU is like having every bone in your body broken, then you get a new skeleton.”
Last-minute EU membership talks focused on a range of issues, including the level of EU aid to Baltic farmers and whether hunters in this heavily forest, sparsely populated region could keep shooting lynx; they were told they could. Lithuania had to agree, with some reluctance, to close its one atomic power plant, the Soviet-built Ignalina, because it poses an environmental threat. Some Lithuanians say that will lead to higher electricity costs.
Advocates say the advantages of joining outweigh any minuses. Businesses may have to grappled with EU red tape, backers argue, but the trade-off will be better access to EU markets and more incoming investment; valuations of Baltic companies, as will as local stock prices, are expected to rise. Tests of whether average Balts buy such arguments from their overwhelmingly pro-EU Baltic governments will come in 2003, when all three states are expected to hold EU-membership referendums. There’s at least a chance they could fail. EU polls pegged Estonia and Latvia as the most skeptical of all candidate nations, with only a third of those asked saying entry would be “a good thing;” other surveys say around 55 percent would vote yes in referendums when the time comes. Pro-EU forces can take comfort in the state of the opposition: it features just a string of ragtag groups. And while governments can be expected to spend millions pushing for yes-votes, anti-EU groups have little to no funds. Most analysts say it’s unlikely Baltic voters, even doubters, will choose to shun one of the world’s most powerful multinational blocs. But skeptics vowed to put up a good fight before any referendums.

Thursday—December 12, 2002
VILNIUS (CITY PAPER) A tanker carrying some 50,000 tons of fuel oil has run aground off the Lithuanian coast, though officials say its hull didn’t appear to be damaged and that it wasn’t leaking. The Princess Pia, sailing under a Panamanian flag and owned by the Argentinean-based Boldwin Maritime, became stuck on the seabed at around 17:30 Wednesday.
It had just set sail for Singapore from Klaipeda, a port city 300 kilometers northwest of Vilnius. Authorities said a tugboat had been guiding it out of the main Klaipeda harbor when the tanker inexplicably took a wrong turn and ran aground. Tugboats failed to dislodge the 250-meter vessel Wednesday; officials said they’d pump all the oil from the ship as a precaution before again trying to free it.
The 23-year-old Princess Pia is double-hulled, which is considered safer than the one-hulled tankers that environmentalists say are prone to leaking. The threat posed by single-hull tankers was highlighted by the sinking of the Prestige last month, causing an ecological disaster along Spain’s coast.

Wednesday—December 11, 2002
TALLINN (CITY PAPER) Estonian police have charged a 19-year-old student with hacking into several key servers, including one belonging to a firm that plans computer security for government agencies. Police arrested Lauri Nomme last month and he’s expected to remain in jail for at least several more days; he was formally charged with three counts of computer theft Tuesday, according to police spokesman Indrek Raudjalg. Each charge carries a maximum penalty of three years in prison, or a monetary fine. Raudjalg said additional indictments could be handed down later against the student at Tallinn’s Technical University.
The charges were among the first filed for computer-related crimes
since this Internet savvy nation regained independence. After communism, Estonia went from having almost no computers to developing one of Europe’s most advanced IT infrastructures. Over two-thirds of bank customers in Estonia, for instance, regularly carry out transactions online. Police set up a new computer-crimes division this past July, “and so we expect to have more such cases in the future,” the spokesman said.
Raudjalg said investigators found incriminating evidence on Nomme’s home computer, which also indicted he’d broken into a local high-school server. But Raudjalg declined to confirm reports in Wednesday’s Postimees daily that the teenager stole passwords giving him access to confidential state data—including of Estonia’s Boarder Guard. “The investigation’s ongoing,” he said. Police are usually quick to release anyone arrested for nonviolent crimes pending trial. But Raudjalg said authorities feared Nomme might try to destroy evidence if he got to a computer.

Tuesday—December 10, 2002
COPENHAGEN (CITY PAPER) The Baltic states have wound down membership negotiations with the European Union—intensive, complicated talks that have been ongoing for several years—and were expected to win historic invitations to join the 15-nation bloc this Thursday. The Baltic governments, and other candidate countries from around eastern Europe, engaged in sometimes-heated, late-night negotiations in Copenhagen to come to a final settlement on money that would be paid to and by the the EU. Final discussions revolved around the amount of money that would be earmarked to fund enlargement in 2004-06; the 10 candidates urged that as much as 43 billion dollars should be paid out, while some key EU donors wanted to spend less. Combined, the Baltics could get well over 5 billion dollars, though they would also have to pay membership fees into the EU. Some news agencies reported that Baltic officials were holding out for higher farm subsidies to the apparent annoyance of EU officials—who said the matter had already been decided and was no longer open for debate. Last minute talks also ranged down to whether Latvians could continue to hunt wild lynx cats; the EU agree that they could. Final membership terms should be known within the next day or two.

Monday—December 9, 2002
RIGA (CITY PAPER) Nikolai Tess, 80, failed to appear in a Latvian court Monday to face charges that he helped deport 138 people, including a five-month-old baby, after Red Army troops occupied this small Baltic nation in the 1940s. His lawyers, as they’d done during two other scheduled trial openings, said their client was too ill to show. The defense team has repeatedly requested that the proceedings be halted on health grounds, arguing that the strain of the trial could kill Tess; they say he suffers from a severe heart ailment and is bed-ridden in the hospital.
Prosecutors say they are prepared to present deportation papers signed by Tess as evidence; the infant and also an 80-year-old woman were on his list of deportees, they said. The events allegedly took place in 1949, five years after Soviet forces invaded Latvia at the end of World War II. Tens of thousands of Latvians at the time were exiled to Siberia, where many died in the harsh conditions.
His indictment renewed Russian criticism of proceedings against ex-Stalinist agents, around 10 of whom have been indicted or convicted since Latvia regained independence. A Russian Foreign Ministry statement last year referred to Tess by name and mentioned others suspects. It said the men were “helpless…disabled war veterans” who couldn’t be held accountable for actions that weren’t illegal at the time under Soviet law. Latvians dismissed the criticism, saying the prosecutions were based on international law and aimed primarily at shedding light on the dark Stalinist era. “How can you justify the deportation of children and old people? What did a five-year-old baby do to deserve being deported?” said Dzintra Subrovska, a prosecutor spokeswoman.

Thursday—December 5, 2002
TALLINN (CITY PAPER) Estonian Foreign Minister Kristiina Ojuland indicated Thursday that she backs calls to seek damage payments from Moscow for five decades of often harsh Soviet rule. She said Estonia could set up a commission this month to accept requests for compensation from survivors jailed or deported to Siberia—usually after being packed in cattle trains—following the 1940 Red Army invasion. Spokesmen for Prime Minister Siim Kallas’s office, however, said the issue was not on the agenda—calling into question whether Estonia would push the initiative forward.
Lithuania in 2000 asked Moscow to pay it 20 billion dollars for Soviet-era abuses; the Lithuanian figure was equivalent to eight times its national budget. Lithuania’s laundry list of damages included the deportation of 100,000 people and the destruction of dozens of churches in the mainly Catholic nation.
Russia flatly rejected Lithuania’s damages bill, saying it wasn’t to blame to for Soviet actions. It also suggested that the Baltic states benefited from Soviet rule, including from the construction of new roads and ports. Lithuania countered by pointing to payments paid by Germany to World War II victims, even though later German leaders didn’t participate in Nazi atrocities
Most concede it’s highly unlikely Russia will ever pay the Baltic states any compensation at all. Marko Mihkelson, a leading Russian affairs analyst in Estonia, said Thursday that the timing for any such compensation claims couldn’t be worse; he said bilateral relations were only beginning to improve. “We had five or six years in a Cold War-like situation and we were just coming out of this now,” he said. “Any little thing like this can ruin these positive trends.”

Tuesday—December 3, 2002
RIGA (CITY PAPER) A report released by the World Population Foundation predicts that Latvia’s population, at current demographic trends, will reduce from its current 2.4 million to just 1.7 million people in 50 years. In all three Baltic states, there are more deaths each year than births. But the WPF report singled out Latvia as having the worst demographic figures in northern Europe.

Friday—November 29, 2002
RIGA (CITY PAPER) Latvian TV has chosen last year’s Eurovision winner Marija Naumova and BrainStorm’s lead singer Renars Kaupers to host the 2003 Song Contest in Riga. The two were earlier rumored to be the frontrunners for the prestigious job. Over 150 million viewers are expected to watch the show, one of Europe’s biggest television events of the year. (For full reports on Latvia’s Eurovision win this year, plus articles on Naumova and Kaupers, see CITY PAPER’s full Song Contest site at http://www.balticsww.com/eurovision.html )

Tuesday—November 26, 2002
Analysis—Parlez Vous into the EU—Recent confirmation that Estonian Prime Minister Siim Kallas is studying French has prompted admiration but also suspicion that he’s bucking for a new job-at European Union headquarters in Brussels. Kallas has been taking private language lessons in his office several days a week over the past year, spokeswoman Hanna Henrikus said.
Estonians who oppose membership in the 15-nation EU have long argued that one reason leaders like Kallas are so enthusiastic about joining is because they could land lucrative jobs in the bloc’s head office once Estonia’s in. But Henrikus emphatically denied Kallas had a job in mind at the EU, where French is one of the main working languages. Influential France also strongly favors candidates for top EU posts who can speak French. “It’s not true. He just really likes France and French culture,” Henrikus said when asked whether Kallas might have his eye on a future EU position. “The idea is to learn something new. He’s very interested in foreign languages.” She added that Kallas-who, in addition to his native Estonian, also speaks English, Finnish and Russian fluently-understood that speaking some French would help foster better bilateral relations with Francophone nations.
The apparent rush to pick up some French isn’t limited to Kallas. His immediate predecessor as prime minister, the staunchly pro-EU Mart Laar, is reportedly also studying French. Employees at Estonia’s foreign ministry have also been required to achieve some level of proficiency in French.
Estonian ministers, including the prime minister, make less than 50,000 dollars a year. EU officials, even lower level ones, can make several times that.
At least two avid EU backers won’t have a problem making the grade in French: Former Estonian President Lennart Meri spent part of his childhood in Paris and speaks fluent French; and current Latvian President Vaira Vike-Freiberga spent much of her adult life in Canada and her French is said to be virtually flawless.

Monday—November 25, 2002
VILNIUS (CITY PAPER) George Bush congratulated the Baltic states on their invitations to join NATO during a weekend visit to Lithuania. Speaking to an enthusiastic crowd at a square in Vilnius on Saturday, Bush vowed that the Baltic nations would never be abandoned in times of crisis. “In the face of aggression, the brave people of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia will never again stand alone,” he said. In response, thousands of Lithuanians who’d gathered to hear him, began chanting “aciu! aciu! aciu!” which means “thank you” in Lithuanian. Bush added, “This is a great day in the history of Lithuania, in the history of the Baltics, in the history of NATO and in the history of freedom.” (See previous story below on the historic invitations issued by NATO to the Baltic states last week.) During his short stopover in Vilnius—the first ever visit by a U.S. president to Lithuania—Bush also held a brief meeting with all three Baltic presidents. He presented his host, Lithuanian president and former U.S. citizen Valdas Adamkus, with a basketball signed “My very best” by Michael Jordan; Adamkus lived in the Chicago area for several decades and remains an avid Chicago Bulls fan.

Tuesday—November 19, 2002
KURESSAARE (CITY PAPER) One of the largest humanity crimes trials since the collapse of the Soviet Union began Tuesday in Estonia, with eight former Stalin-era agents facing charges that they deported over 400 islanders in the 1940s. The trial on Saaremaa, where the events occurred after the Red Army occupied Estonia, has been widely anticipated among the island’s close-knit, 40,000 residents. Saar County Court in Kuressaare—200 kilometers southwest of Tallinn—even rented a conference hall to accommodate all the attendees, including 200 witnesses; days earlier, a circus performed there. “This trial’s about justice, not revenge,” said Henno Kuurmann, spokesman for investigators who spent three years on the case—drawing on KGB secret police files found after Estonia regained independence during the 1991 Soviet collapse.
The ex-agents, in their 70s and 80s, are accused of dispatching purported enemies of the new communist regime on ferries and cattle trains fit with bars to Siberia, over 2000 kilometers away; children were among those exiled. Some 20,000 Estonians—mainly well-to-do farmers—were deported nationwide at the time, in March 1949. Many later perished in the harsh conditions.
The accused have publicly declared their innocence, with several arguing that they didn’t violate any laws in effect at the time in the Soviet Union. “You know, life was different then,” one defendant, Albert Kolga, was quoted as telling Estonia’s Postimees daily last month. “I didn’t break any laws.”
If convicted, they face a maximum sentence of life in prison. Saaremaa deportee Juta Vessik argued that the men should be given some jail time—despite their ages. “Let them try jail for themselves,” the same edition of Postimees quoted her as saying. “After all, they deported old people—even babies.” Only one out of half-a-dozen agents convicted here, Karl-Leonhard Paulov, went to jail. The 77-year-old died this past February after serving one year of an eight-year term.
The accused are Vladimir Kask, 76; Pyotr Kislyi, 81; Viktor Martson, 81, Heino Laus, 75; Stephan Nikeyev, 78; Rudolf Sasask, 76; August Kolk, 77, and Kolga, 78. Kask, Sasask and Laus didn’t show in court Tuesday, citing ill health. Tuesday’s trial was devoted to procedural matters; the 300-page indictment would be read out word for word later this week and the defendants would then enter pleas, according to Kuurmann. He said all would likely plead not guilty.
At least 15 million people were killed and some 40 million deported _ including more than 200,000 from the Baltics—by the vast communist secret police apparatus during Soviet dictator Josef Stalin’s iron-fisted rule. After regaining, all three Baltic states, including Latvia and Lithuania, vowed to prosecute anyone who took part Soviet atrocities. No other ex-Soviet republics have held similar proceedings. Russia has repeatedly denounced the trials as revenge against ailing old men and it has sent its Baltic-based diplomats to observe trials of those carrying Russian passports. It’s also helped cover the defense costs of some accused. Kuurmann said several of the men indicted in Saaremaa do hold Russian passports, though he said he couldn’t immediately name them. He said diplomats from Moscow’s embassy in Tallinn attended Tuesday’s trial.

Monday—November 18, 2002
VILNIUS (CITY PAPER) Nazi hunting groups placed advertisements in several newspapers in Lithuania over the weekend offering a 10,000-dollar reward for evidence leading to the prosecution of anyone who participated in the Holocaust during World War II. “Jews of Lithuania did not disappear! They were mercilessly massacred in Vilnius, Kaunas, Siauliai and over 100 other places of mass murder,” read the text of the large black-and-white ad, featuring a photograph of Nazis beating Jews to death. The Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Center and the Miami-based Targum Shlishi Foundation designed and paid for the advertisement, which included contact telephone numbers of the Lithuanian prosecutors office. Efraim Zuroff, head of the Wiesenthal Center’s Jerusalem office, announced the project to offer money-for-evidence this summer during a visit to Lithuania; he dubbed the project “Operation Last Chance.”

Thursday—November 14, 2002
PANEVEZYS (CITY PAPER) A 24-year-old female prisoner Thursday won what was billed as the world’s first prison beauty pageant—dubbed Miss Captivity—to select Lithuania’s most attractive woman currently serving jail time. (See contest photo here.) The slender, black-haired inmate, held back tears as she accepted her crown inside the Panevezys Penal Labor Colony and before a nationally televised audience. “I can’t believe it…it’s like a dream,” she said. “I hope it will change my life for the better.” The winner used the pseudonym Samanta and declined to give her real name, saying she didn’t want to jeopardize her plans to start a modeling career after she’s released; she also wouldn’t say why she’d been sentenced to four years in jail. The high-security facility holds nearly 500 inmates, including convicted murders; it’s in the city of Panevezys, some 150 kilometers north of Vilnius.
Miss Captivity 2002 fought off challenges from seven other finalists, selected from 38 applicants. The final included a swimsuit competition where inmates appeared in flashy black-leather bikinis with matching knee-high boots; there was also a wedding gown and evening wear section. Top Lithuanian fashion designers made the contestants’ clothes, and local dignitaries served as judges. In addition to the questionable honor of being crowned Miss Captivity, the winner and runners-up will be presented with 10,000 litas, some 2,500 dollars, in prizes—though they can only receive them after completing their jail terms.
Television producer Arunas Valinskas organized the contest in cooperation with prison officials. Authorities excused participating detainees from working in the penitentiary’s sewing factory during the week of the contest. (See a photo of the winner, here.)

Wednesday—November 13, 2002
VILNIUS (CITY PAPER) Lithuania signed an agreement with the United States Wednesday to buy the sophisticated Stinger anti-aircraft missile system—the first Baltic state to purchase the high-tech weaponry. Under the agreement, signed in Vilnius by Lithuanian Defense Minister Linas Linkevicius and U.S. Ambassador to Lithuania John Tefft, Lithuania will acquire 60 missiles and 8 launching pads for 31 million dollars. Tefft said the purchase was a “big step both to assure the defense of the people of Lithuania and to prepare Lithuania’s armed forces to participate fully in NATO operations.” Lithuanian officials said the Stingers will reinforce Lithuania’s overall airborne defense capabilities and also help protect Lithuania’s sole nuclear plant, the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant, from attack. Stinger missiles are close-range, land-to-air missiles equipped with infrared rays that enable warheads to find their target by seeking out heat emissions.

Friday—November 8, 2002
RIGA (CITY PAPER) Einars Repse is no longer packen’ a pistol—as he’s done for years—now that he has become Latvia’s new prime minister. The 41-year-old bachelor, approved as premier on Thursday, has said he doesn’t see the need to carry a small holstered gun beneath his pin-strip suit since he now has a team of permanent bodyguards. His spokesmen said that he carried a gun for much of the recent political campaign, apparently fearing that his years high up in Latvia’s banking sector made him any number of enemies. No high-level politicians have been assassinated in Latvia, though a few businessmen and one judge have been gunned down over the past several years.

Thursday—November 7, 2002
RIGA (CITY PAPER) Latvian parliamentarians approved a new center-right government Thursday. Their approval came, as expected, just days after 41-year-old former Central Bank president and New Era leader Einars Repse was nominated as prime minister. The 100-seat Saeima legislature okayed Repse and his Cabinet by 55 votes to 43; there was one abstention.
The pro-business Cabinet is one of the youngest in Latvian history, reflecting Repse’s own relative youth and his youthful following. A handful of ministers are in their thirties, including 31-year-old Finance Minister Valdis Dombrovskis and Interior Minister Maris Gulbis, who is also 31. BNS reported that the average age of the Cabinet members was 39.
New Era, which has 26 seats, formed a government with the center-right First Party, the centrist Green and Farmer’s Union and right-wing Fatherland and Freedom—giving the coalition 55 seats.

Wednesday—November 6, 2002
TALLINN (CITY PAPER) Russia has agreed to return a pre-war presidential badge to Estonia 62 years after Soviet forces spirited the symbol of Estonian state power out of the country when they invaded, officials confirmed Wednesday. Estonia repeatedly asked Moscow to hand back the large, gold-plated badge after this nation regained its independence during the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991—but Moscow refused without explanation. The surprise announcement that the Kremlin would now give it up after ten years of Estonian lobbying was made Tuesday by Russian Deputy Prime Minister Valentina Matviyenko at the end of a two-day visit to Tallinn.
While Matviyenko—who headed a delegation of trade officials—didn’t say why Russia had a change of heart now, Estonians heralded the decision. In an editorial headlined “Better Late Than Never,” Estonia’s Postimees daily newspaper said the Russian move was a friendly gesture in a bilateral relationship that’s often been strained. Estonian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Anneli Kimber said diplomats still must finalize details about how and when the badge—which Russian officials have kept for decades at the Oruzheinaya Palace museum within the Kremlin’s very walls—will be turned over. “But we see this as a very positive move,” she said Wednesday.
After the Red Army occupied and forcibly annexed Estonia in 1940, hundreds of emblems of Estonian independence were destroyed or taken to Russia in a bid to consolidate Soviet power here. The presidential badge was seen by many as the most precious item lost. “This was one of the most important symbols of the Estonian state and it was robbed by the Soviets. It’s good they’ll finally give it back,” said Toomas Hiio, a leading Estonian historian.
Pre-war Estonian President Konstantin Pats—who regularly wore the heavy, sapphire-jeweled badge around his neck at state functions in the 1930s—was jailed in 1940 and later died in detention; Russia returned his body to Estonia for reburial in 1990. The office of current Estonian President Arnold Ruutel said he could renew the tradition of wearing the badge when it’s returned from Moscow.
Russia consistently refused requests to turn over historical artifacts, including the presidential badge and other artwork, that were pillaged from museums and private homes during 50 years of Soviet rule. Many Estonians have argued for years that their return would help the country reclaim its history and contribute to reconciliation with their giant eastern neighbor.

Friday—November 1, 2002
TALLINN (BNS-CITY PAPER) Edgar Savisaar, the leader of the center-left Center Party, was reelected mayor of Estonia’s most influential city Friday. Savisaar will lead a two-party coalition, including the center-right Reform Party, and can rely on an dominant 43-seat majority in the 63-seat Tallinn council. Savisaar, once discredited for allegedly tape-recording his rivals in secret, has made a dramatic political comeback over the past several years. His Center Party—which also shares power nationally with the Reform Party—made the largest gains in the October 20 local election, while most center-right parties fared poorly. Savisaar, despite his controversial background, is touted as the odds-on favorite to become the country’s next prime minister following March 2 parliamentary elections.

Thursday—October 31, 2002
TALLINN (CITY PAPER) Judges handed down a guilty verdict Thursday against 81-year-old Juri Karpov, saying he helped deport 41 people, including several children, to Siberia after the Soviet Union occupied this Baltic state in the 1940s. Tallinn’s City Court, citing his advanced age, gave him an eight-year suspended sentence and fined him 3,700 kroons (about 230 dollars). For his conviction of crimes against humanity, he faced a maximum penalty of life in prison.
Prosecutors said the ex-Stalinist agent delivered whole families deemed enemies of the new communist regime to cattle trains specially fitted with iron bars and barbed wire for their human cargo. After a 2000-kilometer journey to their internment areas, three died in the harsh conditions of exile. The deportations took place in March 1949, when Soviet forces shipped over 20,000 Estonian to the far-flung corners of Russia.
Evidence presented in court included deportation orders with Karpov’s signature—culled from a cellar KGB archive that was opened to the public after Estonia regained independence. While admitting he worked for the NKVD police—the precursor of the notorious KGB—Karpov maintained his innocence, saying the archive documents placed him at locations he’d never been. He said Thursday he’d appeal. “I did not belong to the circle of people informed about or preparing for the (deportation) operation,” Karpov, wearing a blue double-breasted suit and sporting thick bifocals, told the court earlier this week.
Karpov lives in Tallinn but holds a Russian passport—as do thousands of Russians who settled here during Soviet rule. He’s one of some 20 ex-agents, mostly Estonian citizens, charged over the past decade. All three Baltics vowed to prosecute those who took part in Soviet atrocities, saying the main aim was to shed light on the Stalin era. None of the other nations that emerged from the Soviet collapse held similar proceedings.
Russia has repeatedly denounced such trials as revenge against ailing old men. It’s sent diplomats to observe trials of those carrying Russian passports and helped cover defense costs of the accused, including in Karpov’s case. Spokesmen at Russia’s embassy in Tallinn declined to comment Thursday on the court’s verdict.

RIGA (CITY PAPER) Latvia’s population has shrunk by 12 percent over the past ten years as a result of Russians returning to Russia and a falling birth rate, Latvia’s statistics office reported Thursday. From 1991 to 2001 the national population decreased by 321,000 people and now officially stands at 2,345,768. In 2001, the number of deaths exceeded the number of births by 13,300. On the bright side for those worried about the country’s demographic situation, the pace of population reduction has slowed since 1995, officials said. Estonia and Lithuania have seen similar falls in population.

Monday—October 21, 2002
TALLINN (CITY PAPER) Updated Monday afternoon—The center-left Center Party, led by controversial former Prime Minister Edgar Savisaar, scored a decisive victory in Sunday’s local election— demonstrating the party’s strength going into national elections in March. In the all-important race in Tallinn, by far the largest and most influential city in Estonia, the Center Party won an outright majority of 32 seats on the 63-seat Tallinn City Council; it had over 38 percent of the popular vote. In the outgoing Tallinn administration, the Center Party was in a coalition with the center-right Reform Party; Savisaar was mayor. The Center Party now appears to hold all the cards and could choose to say thanks but no thanks to Reform, which also shares power with the Center Party in the national government. Reform came third in the Tallinn election, winning 15 percent of the vote, translating into 11 seats.
Election campaigning seemed largely devoid of issues and was dominated instead by the personalities of party leaders, with Center trying to portray Savisaar as a man of the people looking out for the little guy. The Center Party had by far the most comprehensive and effective advertising campaign, with many analysts saying it vastly outspent all the other competing parties. Their main slogan, which was also plastered on billboards featuring Savisaar sitting at a chess board, was: “With Us, You Win!” It and other parties attempted to outdo each other promising subsidies to pensioners and children. Voters had expressed disgust about the prevalence of simplistic ads and turnout for the election was a relatively low 52 percent.
In the election, the newcomer center-right party Res Publica also roared onto the political stage, coming in second in Tallinn and doing well in dozens of other local races; it won 21 percent of the vote in Tallinn, or 17 council seats. The success of Res Publica—which campaigned on “ending politics as usual” and stamping out corruption—appears to have come at the expense of other center-right groups. Recent ruling parties Pro Patria and Moderates both failed to land any seats at all in Tallinn, considered a major humiliation for two parties that have played such pivotal roles in national government. Pro Patria won just 7 percent of the vote and the Moderates just under 5 percent. Res Publica’s success in its first-ever election seems to herald its arrival as a force nationally and it is likely to be seen as one of the chief challengers to the clear front-runner Center Party heading into parliamentary elections.
The only other party to have won seats in Tallinn was the Russian-dominated Estonian United People’s Party, which won around 8 percent of the vote and three seats.
Questions may also now arise about how the local results might affect the national coalition comprising of Center and Reform. Their unlikely cooperation in national government was partly based on their cooperation in Tallinn. But now that Center can go it alone without Reform in the capital city, it may try to at least gain more leverage within the Cabinet of Prime Minister Siim Kallas, who heads the Reform Party. Savisaar, who was forced to resign as Interior Minister in the mid-1990s for allegedly secretly tape recording his political rivals, is widely believed to have his eye becoming prime minister after the 2003 national election. Many analysts said his showing in the local election puts that goal well within Savsiaar’s reach.

Tuesday—October 15, 2002
VILNIUS (CITY PAPER) Move over Miss Universe, make room for Miss Captivity, one of the latest and least likely of beauty contests—to pick the most attractive female inmate currently serving jail time in Lithuania. The organizer of the event, television producer Arunas Valinskas, announced this week that he has finalized a deal with the country’s sole female prison and already accepted applications from 36 would-be title holders. “We’ll attempt to find beauty where you might think there is none,” he told a news conference Monday. “The prisoners are, after all, women first and foremost.”
The prison, the Panevezys Penal Labor Colony, holds over 1,000 inmates, including convicted murderers; it’s in the city of Panevezys, some 150 kilometers north of Vilnius. Prison officials said participating detainees would be excused from working in the penitentiary’s sewing factory during the week of the contest.
The competition, said to be the first of its kind in the world, would be shown live on Lithuania’s private LNK TV. Valinskas said the likely contest date was Nov. 15 but that it was subject to change by several days. Top Lithuanian fashion designers would make the contestants’ clothes and local VIPs would serve as the judges, selecting a winner based on “beauty and elegance,” Valinskas said. In addition to what many might see as the dubious honor of being crowned Miss Captivity, the winner and runners up would qualify for 10,000 litas, about 2,500 dollars, in prizes—though they’d only receive them after completing their jail terms.

Monday—October 7, 2002
RIGA (CITY PAPER)—Updated since Saturday and Sunday reports with latest figures from the Latvian Election Commission; includes endnote on the full breakdown of parliamentary seats —The upstart New Era, a pro-business party founded less than a year ago, will almost certainly form the core of a new Latvian government after its triumph in parliamentary elections Saturday; it won some 24 percent of the vote, more than any other single party. The center-right group, headed by the brainy if slightly colorless former Central Banker Einars Repse, was taking the lead Monday in forming the next ruling coalition that would likely see Repse himself as prime minister. Its take of the vote translated to 26 seats, well short of a majority, so it will face days of tough negotiations to stitch together a workable administration from the fragmented 100-seat Saeima. New Era’s campaign often focused on stamping out corruption in government, though it widely agrees with Latvia’s long-standing pro-EU and pro-NATO policies; Repse, a 41-year-old bachelor, is regarded as a no-nonsense fiscal conservative and an all-round financial whiz.
The left-wing For Human Rights, which draws most of its support from the country’s million-strong Russian-speakers, came in second place with about 19 percent of the vote—but it was the only distinctly leftist group to make it through. It has 24 seats and with no political allies in the legislature it will be relegated to the roll of permanent opposition for the next four- year session.
The center-right People’s Party, headed by industrialist Andris Skele, was third with some 17 percent of the vote; that amounted to 21 parliamentary seats. Repse has expressed strong doubts in the past about cooperating with the People’s Party, which otherwise seems like a logical coalition partner for New Era. But Repse sounded more conciliatory as campaigning came to a close and he may be quick to put his reservations aside now that the prime minister’s post is well within his grasp. He has accused People’s of engaging in corruption and frequently blasted People’s Party leaders in stump speeches. New Era would be even less likely to work in any way with the socialist-oriented, pro-Russia For Human Rights.
One of the decisive losers in the Saturday election was Latvia’s Way, one of three ruling parties in the outgoing government along with People’s and the right-wing Fatherland and Freedom. With nearly 100 percent of the vote counted, it looked like it wouldn’t even scrape together the 5 percent of votes needed to enter the legislature. That’s a humiliation for a party that has been part of every single Latvian government since independence in 1991. Latvia’s Way, headed by current Prime Minister Andris Berzins, was apparently penalized by voters for being so closely associated with the discredited establishment; it also had to enact many of the hard-hitting reforms that rescued the economy but left many struggling to make ends meet. “We have, it seems, completed our stage of the road and many want us to pass on the baton,” Latvia Way’s Ivars Godmanis was quoted as telling Reuters.
Fatherland and Freedom appeared to make it just across the threshold giving it seats in parliament, drawing just over 5 percent of the ballots cast. In addition to New Era, there are two other newly founded parties that made it into parliament for the first time: the centrist alliance of Greens and Farmers, and the Christian Latvia’s First Party—both of which won around 10 percent of the vote. Repse could reach out to these three smaller parties to try to put together a government without the People’s Party. It would be virtually impossible, given the distribution of seats, for People’s to take the lead itself in forming a majority government that would lock out New Era.
Turnout for the parliamentary poll, the fourth since 1991, was nearly 75 percent.

Makeup of the new, 100-seat Saeima parliament:

Fatherland and Freedom (rightwing)………… 7 seats
Christian Latvia’s First Party (center-right) .. 10 seats
People’s Party (center-right)……………………. 21 seats
New Era (center-right) ………………………….. 26 seats
Greens and Farmers alliance (centrist) …….. 12 seats
For Human Rights (leftwing) …………………… 24 seats

The first five parties above are all potential coalition partners, all with roughly similar views on big policy questions. Which parties are in or out of a new government may come down to which party leaders can get along personally; New Era’s Repse and People’s Party leader Skele are thought to dislike each other.

Friday—October 4, 2002
RIGA (CITY PAPER) Latvians go to the polls Saturday to elect a new parliament—though the outcome is far from clear. Two center-right parties, the People’s Party and New Era, have both shown up at the top of opinion polls with about 15 percent support each. The left-wing For Human Rights has placed third in most polls, with about 13 percent support. One decisive loser is expected to be the center-right Latvia’s Way, which has played an integral part in every Latvian government since the restoration of independence in 1991; it has consistently failed to draw more than 5 percent backing in most pre-election surveys. Around 20 parties are listed on the ballot, though only half of them are seen as having any chance of winning enough votes to enter the 100-seat Saeima legislature.
The campaign has tended to focus less on issues than on the personalities of the various party leaders; accusations and counter-accusations of corruption have also featured prominently. New Era, founded less than a year ago, is headed by Einars Repse, Latvia’s brainy if dull former central bank president; Repse has pledged to clean up government if he comes to power. The strong showing of his brand new party will be the focus of attention in the election, though there are questions about whether he’ll be in a position to join a coalition government. He has ruled out cooperation with what should otherwise be a natural political partner, the People’s Party, saying its leaders aren’t trustworthy; People’s is headed by Andris Skele, a former prime minister who is closely associated with some of Latvia’s most powerful industries.
The first election results aren’t expected until the early morning hours of Sunday. But it could take days or even weeks before a new coalition government takes shape from what will almost certainly be a badly fragmented legislature. Most bets are that Latvia will get yet another center-right government, though center-left groups could hold the balance of power if they fare better than expected.
All the main parties support Latvia’s pro-West policies, though some members of the For Human Rights bloc have complained bitterly that the country has devoted far too much time and money to the NATO and European Union membership bids. Over a quarter of the electorate are Russian-speakers, and many are expected to back For Human Rights and other left-wing groups.
The current government is a three-party coalition that includes Latvia’s Way, the People’s Party and the right-wing Fatherland and Freedom. Prime Minister Andris Berzins belongs to Latvia’s Way. The government has been viewed as competent but has consistently failed to prompt much enthusiasm among the Latvian public. In the lead-up to the election the ruling parties have also bickered between themselves.
(Election results will be posted on this site soon after they are released. For more details, you can also check the Latvian Central Election Commission website for detailed updates, here.)

Thursday—October 3, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) When Rolandas Paksas said he would engage in a campaign stunt, he wasn’t kidding. The former Lithuanian Prime Thursday launched his campaign for president, that is, by climbing into a turboprop stunt plane and flying it under a bridge in front of hundreds of onlookers.
The daredevil maneuver, considered among the most dangerous aerial stunts, went smoothly, the candidate’s red Yak-50 dipping under the 7-meter high gap between the water and the overhang, then powering high above the Neris River near Vilnius. Two other planes also took part, swooping below the bridge in unison with the 46-year-old Paksas—the logo of his center-right Liberal Democratic Party, an eagle in flight, clearly visible on the wings.
The candidate cum pilot is considered a strong contender for the December 22 presidential election, though incumbent Valdas Adamkus is favored to win. Paksas was prime minister briefly in 1999, then again in 2001; as premier, security officials prohibited him from flying his plane, saying it was too dangerous.

Wednesday—October 2, 2002
TALLINN (BNS-CITY PAPER) The center-left Center Party, headed by controversial Tallinn Mayor Edgar Savisaar, looks set to score the biggest gains in upcoming local elections, according to an opinion poll released Wednesday. The Market Research polling agency reported that 32 percent of 500 voters asked in September said they would support Savisaar’s populist party, which also shares power on the national level with the center-right Reform Party. The Reform Party itself is the second most popular party, with 15 percent backing. This level of support for the two ruling parties would ensure that their coalition in the Tallinn city government remains in place.
The main opposition parties, the center-right Pro Patria Union and the centrist Moderates both registered a mere 5 percent backing in the poll; the newly established Res Publica, a center-right group, would win 7 percent of the vote if the local election were held today, Market Research said.
The October 20 municipal election will be a measure of the popularity of the current Center-Reform Party Estonian government and may also indicate how the ruling-government partners will fare in national elections six months from now. Many Estonians have expressed concern that Savisaar—forced to step down as Interior Minister several years ago amid allegations he secretly tape-recorded his rivals—is now well positioned to become prime minister after the March parliamentary election.

Tuesday—October 1, 2002
RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) Latvia’s three-party coalition government is facing a crisis just days before the October 5 election after Interior Minister Mareks Seglins was sacked for allegedly using his office to crack down on political opponents. The murky scandal has prompted rampant talk of conspiracies and counter-conspiracies but it appears that it won’t topple the outgoing government as its term comes to an end.
Prime Minister Andris Berzins, of Latvia’s Way, fired Seglins, from the People’s Party, after police detained two members of Latvia’s Way because of leaflets they had printed alleging criminal activity by several leading members of the People’s Party. The coalition government is made up of the two center-right parties and one smaller rightwing group, Fatherland and Freedom—though all the parties are competing fiercely for parliamentary seats.
The some 40,000 campaign leaflets in question contained accusations of criminal corruption against specific People’s Party individuals, which police said violated Latvian laws; they hadn’t yet been widely distributed prior to their confiscation by police Monday and their full contents weren’t immediately released to the public. But critics said the move to arrest those involved was politically motivated and violated democratic principles of free speech. Leaders from both parties, including Seglins, denied any involvement in the leaflets or in ordering the detentions.
People’s Party leader Andris Skele said that Berzins had breached the ruling-coalition agreement by abruptly firing the Interior Minister, BNS reported. “The bad news is that the PM will no longer be able to count on the People’s Party support, but the good news is that the elections are here in four days time and Latvia will no longer have this and such a prime minister….The elections will put everything in place,” he was quoted as saying. He did not, however, threaten to withdraw his party from the coalition. BNS also reported that relations between Latvia’s Way and the People’s Party were now seriously strained but that the government would likely stick together at least until after the election.
A new center-right party called New Era (or New Time) is favored to win the most seats in the 100-seat Saiema, though the People’s Party has registered similar support in recent opinion polls—of around 15 percent. No single party is expected to win enough seats in the badly fragmented legislature to form a government on its own, and the general consensus was that Latvia Way’s and the People’s Party would try to form another coalition after the upcoming vote. That scenario now seems more doubtful.
Berzins said Defense Minister Girts Valdis Kristovskis would take over the Interior Ministry’s portfolio from Seglins, doubling his duties in the Cabinet. Kristovskis belongs to Fatherland and Freedom.

Monday—September 30, 2002
TALLINN (BNS-CITY PAPER) Authorities have broken up a criminal ring that smuggled Kurdish asylum seekers from Estonia to Finland, BNS reported Monday. Police arrested nine members of the alleged group, reportedly headed by a leading member of a Tallinn Kurdish association. Finnish border guards earlier this month detained an Estonian-registered yacht illegally transporting over a dozen Kurds—sparking off the investigation in Estonia. Each would-be European Union resident was required to pay 5,000 dollars to be taken abroad; the leaders of the gang had already pocketed over 100,000 dollars, the report said. Those arrested could face up to three years in jail if convicted by an Estonian court. Human trafficking became a serious problem in the years after the collapse of the Soviet Union when Baltic borders became more porous and were pegged by smugglers as among the best routes into mainland Europe.

Monday—September 23, 2002
(CITY PAPER) Analysis: Hell on Wheels—Baltic officials vowed several years ago to take tough action to stem the carnage on local roads, where over 2,000 people were dying in accidents each year.
They’ve failed.
Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia continue to register among the worst traffic fatality rates in Europe—three times rates in some Western European nations, say respective Baltic statistics departments.
Driving here is still distinguished by breathtaking recklessness, excessive speeding and drunkenness. While many drivers blame poor roads, analysts seem to put that low on the list of actual culprits.
Experts say growing prosperity also enabled people to trade in their Soviet-made clunkers for more powerful Western-made cars, which means many people can drive faster, and more dangerously, than ever.
Others point out that cash-strapped police have had to scale down patrols in places, providing comfort to worse-offending drivers that they’ll never get caught, and encouraging a culture of carelessness.
Some officials have themselves aptly demonstrated just how pervasive lousy driving is.
In Latvia this August, Justice Ministry State Secretary Aivars Maldrups was behind the wheel when his Volvo collided with a Lada, killing its driver. Police didn’t immediately identify the cause.
The month before, the No. 2 official at Estonia’s Foreign Ministry was ticketed for drunk driving. Under Secretary Indrek Tarand was fired—though only partly because of the traffic violation.
Fatality figures read like body counts from a small war.
In Lithuania, 706 people out of a population of 3.5 million died in road accidents last year; 7,000 were injured.
Its per capita rate of 20 deaths per 100,000 compares to Britain’s 6 per 100,000. (The European Union average is below 10).
While Lithuania last year registered the highest per capita fatality rate in the Baltics, Latvia and Estonia never lag far behind.
Latvia even had the dubious honor of being listed in the 1998 Guinness World Book of Records as having the world’s highest highway fatality rate. (Latvia’s expected to have some 500 roads deaths in 2002.)
While Estonia’s government did launch a safe-driving ad campaign and parliament established stiffer fines for driving offenses, it hasn’t done much good.
Estonia’s road-death toll has risen 20 percent since last year, officials said in July. Out of the nation’s 1.4 million people, 100 died in the first six months of 2002.
“We’re now looking at over 200 deaths a year, and this is very serious,” Transportation Board spokesman Toomas Ernits said. “We have to think this through….We have to find solutions.”
He added that a country of Estonia’s size should have fewer than 100 road fatalities annually.

Friday—September 20, 2002
RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) A 61-year-old Swedish man who was presumed dead by many of his countrymen has been rescued off Latvia’s coast by the National Coast Guard, BNS reported Friday. Hans Roger Edstrom’s small boat went adrift after his engine stopped; he was lost for almost three weeks and had no food for the last 10 days of his adventure. A Latvian fishing vessal spotted Edstrom late Thursday and rescuers brought him to the seaport town of Ventspils a few hours later. He was examined at a local hospital and released.

Thursday—September 19, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) Lithuania and the United States Thursday discussed the possibility of President George W. Bush visiting Vilnius in the near future, BNS reported. Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus and U.S. Ambassador to Lithuania John Tefft spoke about possible plans during a short meeting at the presidential palace, the agency said. Speculation is that Bush may come to Lithuania right after the November 21-22 NATO summit—at which the Baltic states are expected to win highly coveted invitations to join the alliance. Several dozen American officials arrived in Lithuania earlier this week to begin preliminary preparations for the visit, though no firm confirmation is expected until November. Lithuania media reports say Bush would be accompanied by about 1000 people, including 200 journalists. The highest ranking U.S. official to have visited Lithuania was then-Vice President Dan Quayle in 1992. U.S. President Bill Clinton stopped in Riga briefly in 1994; he was the first and only serving president ever to stop in the Baltics.

Wednesday—September 18, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) Lithuania has registered the highest second-quarter GDP growth in the Baltic states—6.9 percent compared to the same period the year before; Estonia posted a 6.5 percent rate and Latvia a still-respectable 4.9 figure, according to preliminary figures released by Baltic statistic departments. Healthy growth in all three countries is underpinned by what has been surprisingly strong domestic demand. A few analysts have questioned whether growth, at least in Lithuania and Estonia, might be a little too fast—raising a threat that their economies could overheat.

LONDON (BNS-CITY PAPER) A larger Russian role in NATO could cancel out the benefits to the Baltic states of entering the U.S.-led alliance, Professor Henry Nau wrote in the London-based Observer newspaper Wednesday. He pointed in particular to the Council of 20, a new forum designed to give Russia a say (though not a veto) within the alliance. “To put it bluntly, it was a payoff to Russia to acquiesce in the admission of new members to NATO,” wrote Nau, from George Washington University. “If NATO takes in the Baltic states and moves to the borders of Russia, Russia will have to move into the board rooms of NATO,” he added. “But if this is the purpose of the Council of 20, it is deeply contradictory and totally nullifies the significance of NATO membership for the Baltic states.”
Nau said the threat wasn’t that Russia would apply direct military pressure on the Baltics, but that it would try to foment social instability in the Baltic states and use the Council of 20 to justify its actions. “The threat is potential Moscow support for disgruntled Russian minorities in Estonia and Latvia, covert aid to destabilize these countries and subtle commercial pressure to weaken their ties with the West,” he wrote. “Moscow might claim direct responsibility for all these activities and argue that it was only defending itself against instabilities on its borders.”

Tuesday—September 17, 2002
TALLINN (CITY PAPER) Estonia and Lithuania Tuesday added their denials that they had any intention of putting NATO nuclear weapons on their territories once they enter the U.S.-led alliance. “No intention, no plans, no need to deploy nuclear weapons,” said Estonian Defense Ministry spokesman Madis Mikko; he added Estonia hasn’t categorically ruled out the option for all time but that “in the foreseeable future there are no plans.” Lithuania issued similar statements Tuesday, following Latvian Prime Minister Andris Berzins the day before (see Monday’s news below). The strong denials came in response to an unnamed Russian Defense Ministry source telling the Interfax news agency Monday that “we have information that some Baltic heads have already expressed their readiness to deploy any type of NATO weapon, including tactical nuclear arms, after their countries join the alliance.”
Some analysts said the comments probably came from especially hardline anti-NATO factions within the Russian military; the main Kremlin leadership over the past year has maintained its opposition to Baltic NATO membership but has generally softened its rhetoric on the subject.

Monday—September 16, 2002
RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) Riga Monday adamantly denied Russian suggestions that Latvia was ready to deploy nuclear weapons on its territory after it joins NATO within a few years. Latvian Prime Minister Andris Berzins described the assertion—reportedly made by an unnamed Russian Defense Ministry official to the Interfax news agency—as a “provocation…to create fear and panic among people.” “The government,” he told BNS, “has not considered such an issue and has not even heard that there could be something like that.” While Moscow opposes their membership, the Baltics are seen as virtual shoe-ins to soon receive invitations to join NATO.

Friday—September 14, 2002
VILNIUS (CITY PAPER) Another 100 skeletal remains of Napoleon’s ill-fated army that invaded Russia in 1812 have been uncovered at a new site in Lithuania, adding to the 2000 found last year, archeologists said Friday. The latest bodies were found about 100 meters from the mass grave accidentally discovered a year ago by road construction crews at a new housing development in central Vilnius. “This time we were quite sure we’d find something. It was expected,” said Arunas Barkus, a Lithuanian archaeologist speaking by cell phone from inside the excavation pit.
Shards of French soldiers’ uniforms and buttons were also found at the site, which Barkus said is in the shadow of a brand new apartment building. At least 3,000 other skeletons could be in the new grave—found as scientists resumed searching the area this week. Work to recover the bones would take at least a month, Barkus said.
Experts had already said the grave found in 2001 was among the largest and most historically significant of its kind. At least 20,000 other skeletal remains may still remain undiscovered in the area, Barkus said. Studies of the earlier bodies have helped explain how soldiers in Napoleon’s 500,000-strong army perished in one of history’s most catastrophic military campaigns.
When Napoleon’s army marched into Lithuania bound for Moscow, it was one of the largest forces ever assembled. Six months later, what was left of it, some 40,000 men, retreated back into Vilnius in freezing cold; most quickly died. Reoccupying Russians couldn’t dig graves in the frozen ground, so they threw thousands of soldiers’ bodies into a defensive trench dug earlier by the French—which the Lithuanian builders stumbled upon nearly 190 years later. Barkus said both mass graves are part of the same trench complex.

TALLINN (CITY PAPER) Confirmation this week that Estonian Prime Minister Siim Kallas is studying French has prompted admiration but also suspicion he’s bucking for another job—at European Union headquarters in Brussels, Belgium. Kallas has been taking private language lessons in his office several hours a day week over the past year, spokeswoman Hanna Henrikus said Friday.
Estonians who oppose membership in the 15-nation EU have long argued that one reason leaders like Kallas are so enthusiastic about joining is because they could land lucrative jobs in the bloc’s head office once Estonia’s in. But Henrikus emphatically denied Kallas had in mind a job with the EU, where French is one of the main working languages. Influential France also strongly favors candidates for top EU posts who can speak French. “It’s not true. He just really likes France and French culture,” Henrikus said when asked whether Kallas might have his eye on a future EU position. “The idea is to learn something new. He’s very interested in foreign languages.”
She added that Kallas—who, in addition to his native Estonian, also speaks English, Finnish and Russian fluently—understood that speaking some French would help foster better bilateral relations with Francophone nations. “It’s probably too much to say he wants to speak fluently,” she said. “But he wants to be able to have a simple everyday conversation, and to be able to read papers—to understand political thinking in France.”
Estonian ministers, including the prime minister, make less than 50,000 dollars a year. EU officials, even lower level ones, can make several times that.
The apparent rush to pick up some French isn’t limited to Kallas. His immediate predecessor as prime minister, the staunchly pro-EU Mart Laar, is reportedly also studying French. Employees at Estonia’s foreign ministry have also been required to achieve some level of proficiency in French.
Since the 1991, English has overtaken Russian in Estonia as the most widely spoken second language among Estonians around 40 or younger.
(Also on this site, see EuroDoubts, about some underlying skepticism about EU membership.)

Thursday—September 12, 2002
RIGA (CITY PAPER) Renars Kaupers, the lead singer for the popular Latvian band BrainStorm, told CITY PAPER magazine that he and 2002 Eurovision winner Marija Naumova have a good chance of serving as the hosts of the Song Contest in Riga in 2002. “It’s not 100 percent, but I think it will happen,” he said in the September/October edition of the pan-Baltic publication. “I have had some talks with the Eurovision organizers about this and I am positive about it.”
Eurovision host is a highly coveted position, providing a chance for world fame before a TV audience of over 150 million. The hosts also help set the show’s tone and are a crucial element in making the extravaganza a success. Both Kaupers and Naumova are seen as having bubbly, good-natured personalities, and many observers have already argued for months that they could make a Dream Team as the 2003 Song Contest hosts.
Kaupers himself rocketed to European-wide awareness after BrainStorm took part in the 2000 Eurovision Song Contest. The Beatlesque rock band came in third, but was widely pegged by critics as the contest’s best performer. BrainStorm has since gone on to significant commercial success around Scandinavia, in Poland and Russia, as well as in far away Indonesia. Their songs Maybe and My Star hit No. 1 in several markets. Naumova won Eurovision in Tallinn in May singing I Wanna.
Kaupers also told CITY PAPER that Latvia had a chance to pump new life into the Song Contest, which critics sometimes deride as too glitzy and staid. “Latvia hosting the Eurovision finals is a possibility to change something in this contest, to make it more exciting,” he said.
(Also see CITY PAPER’s Eurovision homepage, here.)

Wednesday—September 11, 2002
RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) The three Baltic states marked one year since the terrorist attacks in the United States at church services and concerts, with many in the staunchly pro-U.S. nations laying flowers and candles outside American embassies.
In Riga, Mozart’s Requiem was performed in the early morning as part of what was dubbed a rolling requiem, when choirs in 26 nations repeated the D minor opus at 8:46 a.m.—the time showing on clocks in New York as a first plane struck the World Trade Center. “On Sept. 11 last year we all were deeply shocked,” said Latvian Prime Minister Andris Berzins before the concert began in Riga’s Dome Church. “Then and today, all the world’s honest people stood together with America and her people.”
Estonia’s government organized an evening concert, featuring American jazz and rock music performed by local bands, within stone ruins of the 15th century Pirita Monastery in Tallinn. Half of Wednesday’s 44-page Postimees newspaper, Estonia’s main daily, was devoted to the anniversary; it included a full-page picture of the World Trade Center before the attacks with a headline in English that read, “We Love NY.”
Latvian President Vaira Vike-Freiberga was in New York Wednesday to attend tributes there, as was Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus—who was in Washington last year when a suicide jet hit the Pentagon and who saw smoke billowing from the crash.

Tuesday—September 10, 2002
RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) A new, upstart party continues to come out on top of opinion polls in advance of October 5 Latvian elections, though neither it nor any other single group seems destined to win an outright majority in the 100-seat Saeima, BNS reported. The center-right New Time, which is headed by the populist former Central Bank president Einars Repse, garnered almost 17 percent of voter support in a most recent poll; it’s followed by another center-right grouping, People’s Party, with about 15 percent. A leftist alliance, For Human Rights in United Latvia, would come in third with 10 percent if the election were held today. The ruling Latvia’s Way, from which Prime Minister Andris Berzins hails, would fare badly, pulling in little more than 4 percent of the ballots.
The current coalition includes Latvia’s Way and the People’s Party plus the right-wing Fatherland and Freedom, which registered a mere 5 percent support in the latest poll, according to BNS.

Monday—September 9, 2002
PALANGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) Thieves Monday stole what is believed to be Europe’s third largest piece of amber from a museum in Lithuania. The nearly 4-kilogram amber, dubbed the Stone of the Sun for its unusually bright yellow glow, was the showpiece of the Amber Museum in Palanga, a resort town some 325 kilometers northwest of Vilnius; police declined to provide an estimate of the missing amber’s value.
Palanga Police Chief Edmundas Krazauskas said several people probably took part in the well-organized robbery around 4:30 a.m. local time. A ladder was used to reach a window on the museum’s second floor, where the amber was kept in a glass case. An alarm went off, but the thieves fled with the amber before security guards could force there way through an entrance door that the intruders had blocked with wood and barbwire.
The same piece was stolen in 1990, though police recovered it within months. The Amber Museum—located in a 19th century manor house—has over 20,000 amber jewels, stones and carvings, though police said nothing else appeared to have been taken Monday.
Most of the world’s amber—40-million-year-old fossilized tree resin—is from the eastern coast of the Baltic Sea. The highly prized translucent material is also known regionally as Baltic Gold.

Friday—September 6, 2002
VILNIUS (CITY PAPER) Valdas Adamkus, a former U.S. citizen who shocked observers by winning Lithuania’s presidential race as a dark horse in 1998, announced he’ll stand for a second five-year term, his office said Friday. The lanky, white haired 75-year-old, who worked for decades as a top environmental regulator in Chicago before returning to his ancestral homeland in the late ’90s, is favored to win the December 22 popular vote.
“I can’t remain calm if I don’t attempt to complete unfinished business,” he was quoted as saying by a spokeswoman, Lina Stonciene, in a speech late Thursday in which he formally declared his candidacy. He singled out high rates of poverty in the nation of 3.5 million people that has otherwise seen dynamic economic growth. “A part of our society is still impoverished and progress in dealing with this has been too slow,” he was quoted as saying.
During his term as president, a mostly ceremonial post, Adamkus also has been outspoken about incompetence and corruption in some government sectors; he’s been a forceful advocate for Lithuanian membership in NATO and the European Union. The president does play a key role in mediating the formation of governments and serves as the No. 1 foreign envoy.
Adamkus is the first major politician to say he’ll run. But Prime Minister Algirdas Brazauskas, of the leftwing Social Democrats, and Speaker Arturas Paulauskas, of the center-left New Union, could be formidable challengers. They’re expected to announced their candidacies in several weeks.

TALLINN (CITY PAPER) Charges have been filed against 19 people allegedly responsible for Estonia’s worst-ever case of alcohol poising that killed 68 last year; one suspect was indicted for murder, police said Friday. Police handed the indictments late Thursday to prosecutors, who were expected to ratify the charges—a last step before trials could begin later this year, said police spokesman Indrek Raudjalg.
One 34-year-old man was charged with murder and faces a life jail sentence; he allegedly sold ten 200-liter barrels of methanol to distributors knowing the highly toxic substance would be sold on as a beverage. Most of the other suspects were charged with criminal negligence leading to death, which carries a maximum three-year prison term. Raudjalg declined to provide the names of any of those charged, but said their ages ranged from 17 to 76. He said the murder suspect remained in police custody, while the other accused were released pending trial.
Victims died after drinking the same batch of methanol-laced liquor in Parnu County; over 80 people were injured, including several who became permanently blind. They were mostly poorer Estonians who bought the alcohol because it was cheaper than legal brands, costing about 2 dollars per half-liter compared with at least 6 dollars in licensed stores. The man charged with murder made a profit of 50,000 kroons, or 3,100 dollars, from the sale of the methanol-based drink, according to Raudjalg.
Methanol, also called methyl or wood alcohol, is sometimes used by illegal distilleries to increase the potency of their liquor or added by mistake. It is used in antifreeze and blamed for hundreds of deaths worldwide each year. Alcohol poisonings have occurred sporadically each month in Estonia, where black-market alcohol is widely used, but never before in such large numbers at one time.

Thursday—September 5, 2002
WASHINGTON (BNS-CITY PAPER) Estonian Prime Minister Siim Kallas met President George W. Bush in the White House Wednesday to discuss, among other issues, NATO expansion and a dispute over the International Criminal Court—which Washington opposes and the European Union staunchly backs. Kallas told reporters later that he was told U.S. requests for the Baltics to sign deals granting immunity from the court to its citizens weren’t linked to NATO expansion; the EU has signaled it opposes such agreements. “Estonia is not in a situation where it has to choose between mother and father,” between the U.S. or the EU, Kallas reportedly told Radio Free Europe.
Also in on the 45-minute meeting was White House National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, Chief of Staff Andrew Card and U.S. Ambassador to Estonia Joseph DeThomas. Kallas was slated to meet former U.S. Vice-President Al Gore on Thursday.

RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) A record number of wildfires, some 1,500, have broken out this year in Latvia—illustrating just how dry the entire Baltic region has been over the past several months. Nearly 20 of the fires, the vast majority starting during the summer, have burned at least 10 hectares of forest and marsh land, BNS reported. Forests across the Baltic states remain extremely dry and fire-hazard warnings have been in effect in all three countries for weeks. Levels of rainfall have been among the lowest in decades.

Wednesday—September 4, 2002
RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) Five people died and three were injured in an early morning fire in a residential building in the town of Dagda, in southeastern Latvia, BNS reported Wednesday; three of the victims were children. Police said they suspected arson was the cause of the fire in the two-story wooden building, though they didn’t immediately provide details. When firefighters arrived at 4:30 a.m., the bodies of two adults and two boys were found at the scene; a small girl died in an ambulance en route to a local hospital. It was one of the worst incidents of its kind in recent years.

Tuesday—September 3, 2002
RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) Santa Claus is reportedly preparing to establish an office in Riga, which would be his first full-fledged representation in the Baltic states, BNS reported. The Santa Claus in question hails from Finland’s Lapland, where there is a multi-million dollar industry catering to wintertime tourists pursuing Old St. Nick. The Man himself is set to arrive in the Latvian capital on Sept. 6 to lay the business groundwork for the office, which would be the first of its kind outside Finland. BNS said his expenses are being paid for by the Riga City Council and the Forma Pro TV company.

RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) Latvian officials turned down a request by Russian nationalist Parliamentarian Vladimir Zhirinovsky for a visa to visit the Baltic state, with reports that he has long been on a blacklist of people not welcome in the country, according to BNS Tuesday. He requested the visa to take part in a TV program, the news agency said. In a letter concerning the visa request—republished in the local press—Zhirinovsky warned Latvia’s ambassador to Russia that “if any rude and discriminating measures are used against me as the Deputy Chairman of the Russian Duma, I will categorically demand the withdrawal of your presence from Moscow.” The scandalous Russian politician in the past has bitterly condemned the Baltic states and said they were destined to be reabsorbed into a Greater Russia.
(Also on this site, see Zhirinovskyisms.)

Monday—September 2, 2002
VILNIUS (CITY PAPER) Lithuania this week launched a novel program to deal with a shortage of traffic police: It’s cut new ones out of cardboard and propped them up on the side of streets to scare motorists into slowing down. About 300 of the cardboard cops have been placed at road crossings near 90 schools in Vilnius a spokeswoman for the municipality, Rasa Razgaitis, said. She said the program coincides with the start of school in the nation of 3.5 million people. The life-sized replicas, painted turquoise green of actual Lithuanian police uniforms, are expected to stay in service for several months. The some 10,000 dollars of materials required to fashion the police impersonators were donated by Kappa Packaging Baltics, a leading producer of boxes in this Baltic Sea coastal country.
Razgaitis said anecdotal evidence suggests the sight of the replicas, first deployed Monday, has, as hoped, caused drivers to hit their breaks. She said Vilnius has made improving traffic safety a high priority. Lithuania, like her Baltic neighbors, registers among the highest road fatality rates in Europe, with over 700 people dying each year, or around 20 deaths per 100,000 residents. The average annual rate in European Union countries is under 10 per 100,000.

Friday—August 30, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) Britain’s BBC broadcasting giant has made a rare apology to Lithuania for misreporting that the Baltic state was on a United Nations list of countries that have violated a worldwide arms embargo on Somalia, BNS reported Friday. Lithuanian officials said the UN actually listed Latvia earlier in the summer, while both the BBC and the AFP news agency wrongly singled out Lithuania in July reports. Lithuanian Deputy Foreign Minister Justas Vincas Paleckis had made a direct appeal to the BBC to acknowledge the mistake, saying such erroneous dispatches “harm the country’s image as well as understanding and trust between people and nations.” The BBC said in a letter address to the Lithuanian Foreign Ministry—released to local media this week—that “we admit Lithuania has not been mentioned and the fact confirms that our information was wrong.”

TALLINN (BNS-CITY PAPER) Three workers at the Baltic Ship Repairers company in Tallinn were killed Friday after being exposed to a poisonous sewage gas in a water treatment facility; one person was injured. The men had gone to a basement where pipes collect and divert sewage when they inhaled the deadly fumes. Chemical experts told BNS that the gas was most likely a mixture of methane and hydrogen sulfide, which are byproducts of natural decomposition. Officials said it was the first such accident on record since Estonia regained independence. The full names of the victims were not given.

Tuesday—August 27, 2002
(CITY PAPER) Analysis: Human Trafficking—Baltic and Nordic officials said recently that the trafficking of women for prostitution in the region has boomed over the past five years. There are an estimated 10,000-20,000 women working as prostitutes in the Baltic states, and scores more who have traveled to the Nordic countries to work there—sometimes after being coerced. “We want this problem to be on the agenda,” said Carita Peltonen, a leading Finnish women’s activist. “If there is political will, you can end this business.”
In a June State Department report, the United States also chimed in on the issue, putting Latvia and Estonia in a group of countries that “weren’t meeting minimum standards” but at least “making significant efforts” to halt human trafficking; they were in dubious company with the Philippines, Sierra Leone and several dozen other nations. Lithuania, where anti-prostitution laws are stricter, was said to be “complying fully.”
The regional sex trade usually involves poorer women from the Baltics or Russia going to the richer Nordics to serve as prostitutes—transit made possible when the Iron Curtain came down. Swedish Minister for Gender Equality Affairs Margareta Winberg said that each year some 500 prostitutes are brought into Sweden—mostly from the Baltics and Russia; she said the practice was not widespread prior to 1997. Thousands of sex tourists from Finland, Sweden, Norway and Denmark also travel to the Baltic states to use prostitutes, many of whom are under 18; Finnish tourists account for nearly 50 percent of those paying for sex in Estonia, according to the Estonian Health Ministry.
Worldwide, up to 4 million women and children have been lured, tricked or forced into the sex trade, said Gunilla Ekberg, an expert on the subject. “Trafficking of women has become a relatively low-risk, high-profit activity attracting individual traffickers and organized crime groups,” she said. The trade in women generates some 7 billion dollars every year internationally and, in some ways, is more profitable than the trade in narcotics, according to Peltonen. “A drug you use once,” she said. “You can use a woman til she dies.”
Officials around the Baltic Sea region began focusing in earnest on the problem after a major women’s conference in Vilnius last year, organized by the Nordic Council of Ministers and the Baltic ministries of health. A similar conference was held recently in Tallinn and another will be held in Riga later this year. The Nordic Council and Baltic governments earlier in 2002 year launched a 200,000-dollar campaign aimed primarily at education—including of Baltic women about the pitfalls of prostitution.
There’s not unanimity, however, about how to combat prostitution. Laws around the Nordic region vary, for instance, with Sweden implementing strict prohibitions on buying sex and Denmark legalizing some forms of prostitution. “Legalizing prostitution is a way of giving up and bowing to pressure from the international sex industry,” Winberg argued. “I’m convinced these nations won’t be able to effectively deal with trafficking.” Over the years, Estonia and Latvia have discussed ways of legalizing aspects of prostitution—though there now seems to be significant local opposition to the idea.

Monday—August 26, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) Arvydas Sabonis is reportedly close to signing a contract that would see him return to his former team in the NBA, the Portland Trail Blazers. The 2.20-meter (7-foot-3) center was expected to sign a one-year contract worth 7 million dollars, according to the Saturday edition of Lietuvos Rytas, a leading newspaper in Sabonis’ native Lithuania. The daily reported Monday that Sabonis attended his brother’s wedding in Lithuania over the weekend. It added that the 37-year-old was expected to sign the contract this week but that it didn’t know where or when. Neither he nor his agent, Herb Rudoy, were immediately available to confirm the reports and it wasn’t clear whether Sabonis was still in Lithuania or already en route to Portland.
Sabonis, considered one of the best basketball players to hail from Europe, announced his retirement from the NBA last year—though he played briefly this year for Kaunas Zalgiris, a Lithuanian team he partly owns. His three-year, 30-million-dollar contract with Portland ended last year. While he was included on the team roster before the 2001-02 season, he refused to play after he broke two toes while vacationing. Sabonis, who turns 38 in December, was a fan favorite during six seasons in Portland. He averaged 10.1 points and 5.4 rebounds in the team’s 2000-01 campaign. After the season, he opted not to renew his contract.

TALLINN (CITY PAPER) Danish Foreign Minister Per Stig Moeller said Monday the European Union won’t force EU-candidates to adhere to the bloc’s policy on the International Criminal Court—a body the U.S. opposes. “It’s not for us to tell them what to do,” Moeller, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, told a news conference during a one-day meeting of Nordic and Baltic foreign ministers to discuss EU and NATO issues. “I hope, of course, they want to have a common position with the EU as members of the EU very soon,” he said in Tallinn, Estonia’s capital. “But we’re not putting pressure. We inform, so everybody knows what’s going on.”
The U.S., fearing its citizens could be prosecuted for actions in peacekeeping or combat, upset the EU by asking countries striving to enter the 15-nation bloc to grant immunity to Americans from the court. Israel and Romania, one of 10 nations hoping to join EU, are the only countries so far to have signed immunity deals with Washington. The EU says it’ll set its policy on the immunity requests within a few weeks. Moeller declined to comment on reports the EU was leaning toward the view that such bilateral immunity treaties violate international law. Most countries vying to join the EU are also bidding to join the U.S.-led NATO or are already members of the defensive alliance, putting them in an awkward position of trying to please both the EU and U.S. The U.S. ratcheted up the pressure when Pierre-Richard Prosper, U.S. ambassador for war crimes, recently said Washington’s relations with NATO would be affected if the EU opposes immunity deals. He didn’t elaborate.
Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania are considered front-runners to join both the EU and NATO, and are among those now put on the spot. The three Baltic states, all of whom have been approached by the U.S. about signing immunity deals, have said they’ll wait for the EU policy—but stopped short of promising to follow the EU’s lead. Latvian Foreign Minister Indulis Berzins said he was clear about the U.S. position but looking forward to knowing the EU’s official stand. “It’s difficult to say if we’re caught in the middle since we still don’t know the EU position,” he said. “We’re candidates to the EU and NATO and we’d be happy to see a common position between the EU and U.S.”

Friday—August 23, 2002
BRATISLAVA (BNS-Reuters) U.S. Senator John McCain said Thursday he expected a “big bang” expansion of NATO, but that the alliance’s planned enlargement would be the last for some time. NATO is expected to choose new members at its November summit in Prague. “I think you are going to see the big bang. I think you are going to see a large number of countries (granted membership), and I think you are going to see a bridge that goes all the way to Turkey,” the Republican senator, a member of the U.S. Senate’s Armed Force Committee, said in Bratislava.
Nine states are vying for entry, but seven—Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovenia, Slovakia, Romania and Bulgaria—are seen as having the best chances for entry. NATO diplomats say there’s pressure from Washington for as wide an enlargement as possible to support the United States’ “war on terror.”

Thursday—August 22, 2002
TALLINN (CITY PAPER) The U.S.-based NRG Energy is suing Estonia’s power utility for 153 million dollars after the collapse of what was this country’s largest privatization, officials announced Thursday. NRG seemed close to finalizing the purchase of Estonia’s main power plants when the government annulled the unpopular deal on Jan. 8 this year—citing NRG’s failure to meet a deadline to secure loans to refurbish the aging, shale-driven stations. Based in Minneapolis, Minnesota and majority owned by Xcel Energy, NRG was to buy 49 percent of two plants producing over 90 percent of Estonia’s electricity; it was to pay 70 million dollars and invest 300 million more.
Estonian Energy received papers Wednesday that the damages claims were filed in a British court. The state power company’s spokesman, Erki Peegel, said NRG accused the utility of “not fully cooperating in concluding the sale.” “This suit is completely ungrounded,” Peegel said. Representatives for NRG, one of the world’s largest energy producers that has faced financial hardships over the past year, weren’t immediately available for comment.
U.S. diplomats strongly backed NRG in five years of sometimes tense talks that culminated in a signed agreement in 2000. They urged Estonia to salvage the deal when it fell apart, though Estonians disregarded that appeal. Critics regularly lashed out at the power plant sale, saying it promised unfairly high profits to NRG and would lead to higher electricity prices. Others said both NRG and supportive American officials applied undue pressure on Estonia.
Backers argued the sale would raise capital needed to update the Soviet-built plants and strengthen already close ties with Washington, enhancing Estonia’s national security. In the end, the disintegration of the privatization deal ended up causing rare strains in U.S.-Estonian relations.
(For a report about the NRG deal from before it seemed doomed to fail, see Power Play, on this site.)

VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) The pending withdrawal from Lithuania of the U.S. energy group Williams International, which managed the Mazeikiai Oil conglomerate here for the past three years, will mean the loss of the Lithuanian National Philharmonic’s most generous patron, BNS reported Thursday. Philharmonic Director Egidijus Miksys told BNS that the pullout of the company’s investments from Lithuania will hit the orchestra especially hard. “We deeply regret the Williams withdrawal,” he said. He said Williams had allocated more money to the National Philharmonic than any other single source; the report didn’t provide a figure. Miksys expressed the hope the orchestra would now be able to foster similarly good relations with the new majority owner of Mazeikiai Oil—Russia’s Yukos.
(For a full report about the planned buyout of the Williams stake in Mazeikiai Oil, see Tuesday’s news below.)

Wednesday—August 21, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) The new wife of Lithuanian Prime Minister Algirdas Brazauskas may enter politics for the first time, telling a local newspaper that she’s thinking about running in December local elections. Kristina Brazauskiene told the Respublika daily that she may vie for a place on the Vilnius city council on the list of the left-wing Social Democrats, her husband’s party. Prime Minister Brazauskas, 69, married the 53-year-old former hotel director in April amid intense press speculation in the Catholic country about his marital status. Journalists questioned whether or not he had actually divorced his wife of several decades before courting his current spouse; Brazauskas insisted he had divorced his first wife Julija a year before he married again.

Tuesday—August 20, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) Russia’s Yukos oil company agreed Tuesday to buy a majority stake in the partly U.S.-owned Mazeikiai Oil refinery—Lithuania’s largest enterprise—though several leaders in the Baltic state sharply criticized the deal. Yukos would raise its current stake to 53.7 percent by purchasing the 26.85 percent shares held by the Texas-based Williams International for 85 million dollars, spokesmen for the two companies announced. Yukos would also assume management control from Williams, according to Williams official and current Mazeikiai Oil chairman Randy Majors. He said he expected the deal to be approved by the government and finalized next month.
The announcement seemed to take Lithuanian officials completely by surprise, angering many. President Valdas Adamkus denounced Williams, suggesting any talks should have included the government, which has a 40.66 percent in Mazeikiai Oil. “Such backstage actions are unacceptable,” he said in a statement. “(This) pushes Lithuania into a complicated situation.”
Leaders have expressed reservations in the past about Russian companies gaining too large an economic foothold in Lithuania, fearing it could give Moscow dangerous political leverage. Mazeikiai Oil which also includes a pipeline and offshore oil terminal, accounts for around 10 percent of Lithuania’s annual gross domestic product. It had a turnover of more than 500 million dollars last year.
In 1999, after heavy lobbying by U.S. diplomats, the government picked Williams to be the core owner of Mazeikiai to strengthen ties with Washington and bolster the country’s bid to join the U.S.-led NATO alliance. The privatization of Mazeikiai Oil, some 300 kilometers northwest of Lithuania’s capital, Vilnius, was the biggest since Lithuania regained independence. The sale to Willimas was politically unpopular and prompted fierce debate; it also contributed to the collapse of two government coalitions.
Mazeikiai has struggled over the past two years, losing some 100 million dollars during the period. Inconsistent deliveries of Russian crude have underpinned its financial difficulties. In June, Yukos bought an initial 26.85 percent stake in Mazeikiai for 75 million dollars in cash and 75 million dollars in investment and guaranteed annual supplies of 35 million barrels of crude for 10 years. With that agreement Yukos was given priority to buy stocks that other shareholders wanted to relinquish—opening the door for the deal announced Tuesday. While the government would now have the option of purchasing a majority stake itself, most analysts said it was unlikely to do so and would reluctantly give the Yukos-Williams agreement the nod.

Monday—August 19, 2002
RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) The European Union will establish its policy regarding a dispute between Brussels and Washington over the International Criminal Court and says EU candidates, including the Baltic states, should follow it. Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, said during a Baltic-Nordic meeting in Riga that the EU will set firm policy guidelines on Sept. 4. “We have informed the candidate countries and I’m satisfied that most indicate they will follow this common decision,” he told a Riga news conference.
The EU earlier asked candidates not to sign deals granting immunity to U.S. troop, saying the agreements contradict its strong backing for the court; U.S. diplomats have recently approached all three Baltic states about signing such immunity deals. Washington strongly opposes the international court, fearing its troops could face prosecution for actions in peacekeeping or combat missions. Washington failed to get the U.N. Security Council to agree to blanket immunity for American personnel before The Hague-based court and so has sought agreements from individual nations. So far, only Israel and Romania have signed.
The Baltics are considered leading candidates to join both the EU and the U.S.-led NATO alliance in part because they’ve succeeded in cultivating close relations with both the EU and U.S. This is a rare case where they are caught in the middle, and risk offending one or the other. The Baltic prime ministers said at the same news conference in Riga that they would wait for the EU policy ruling and they strongly hinted they would follow it; but they stopped short of saying they necessarily would. Some commentators have questioned whether the EU demand for candidates to fall in line is a violation of their national sovereignty.

TALLINN (BNS-CITY PAPER) Russia’s Foreign Ministry has paid for Moscow lawyer Vakhtang Fyodorov to defend former KGB agent Vladimir Penart against crimes against humanity charges in Estonia, BNS reported Monday. The Foreign Ministry’s legal department has also helped prepared the case for Penart, the report said, citing a statement by Russian officials to the RIA Novosti news agency. The Kremlin has criticized Baltic prosecutions of ex-Stalinist agents in the past, but hasn’t normally taken such an active role in the defense of an accused.
Penart, 77, was indicted last year for hunting down and executing men who had withdrawn to Estonia’s forests in the 1950s to resist Soviet rule. The indictment alleged that he was involved in killing three men. The murders allegedly occurred when Penart worked for the Soviet Interior Ministry in 1953 and 1954, a decade after the Red Army occupied Estonia. If convicted, he faces a maximum jail term of 15 years.
The Baltic states have pledged to prosecute those who took part in Soviet-era atrocities; more than a dozen trials have been held so far. Baltic authorities say they are securing long-delayed justice, while Moscow has regularly denounced the prosecutions as politically motivated and vengeful.

Friday—August 16, 2002
TALLINN (BNS-CITY PAPER) A construction-crane vehicle hit a crowded Tallinn city bus Friday and its boom then careened into one of the bus’s two carriages, killing two commuters and injuring at least 11 others, several seriously, BNS reported. Initial reports blamed the accident on the driver of the crane, which ripped a three-meter hole into the side of the No. 67 bus. Tallinn Mayor Edgar Savisaar was quoted by BNS as saying the accident at the downtown intersection of Gonsori and Raua was the worst of its kind in the city in years.

KIEV (BNS) A four-seat Cessna from Lithuania crash-landed Friday in the vicinity of the village of Devinkove, near the Ukrainian capital Keiv, the head of Lithuanian Civil Aviation Administration, Alvydas Sumskas, told BNS. The pilot of the plane, Gintautas Zube, told Sumskas that neither he nor the two Lithuanian passengers on board were injured. After the plane crashed in the forest, the three left the wreck and went on foot to a nearby village for help. The Cessna-172 LY-LLA is owned by the Klaipeda, Lithuania-based Laivyte and used by the Aeronika company.

RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) A public opinion poll released Friday indicated that 66 percent of Latvian residents support the country’s bid to join NATO; that figure is up from 63 percent earlier this year. Some 25 percent of those asked by the Latvijas Fakti polling agency said they opposed entry, with the rest either not responding or saying they were undecided. BNS reported that more than 40 percent of non-Latvians in the survey said they opposed membership.
The three Baltic states are expected to receive invitations to join the alliance as soon as November, and then formally enter the organization about a year later.

Thursday—August 15, 2002
TALLINN (CITY PAPER) Estonian Culture Minister Signe Kivi said Thursday she submitted her resignation, citing financial irregularities at a key cultural fund under her ministry’s jurisdiction. Kivi said she’d tried but failed to get an explanation for how 6.5 million kroons (400,000 dollars) went missing from the so called Cultural Endowment, whose total 2002 budget is 83 million kroons (5 million dollars). “Feeling responsible for what has happened, I informed the prime minister on Wednesday of my wish to step down,” Kivi, 45, said in a statement. She announced the move publicly only on Thursday.
Police said they have arrested Avo Viiol, the chief manager of the fund that supports a range of activities, from Estonia’s opera to architectural projects to grants for novelists. Viiol would likely be indicted for misuse of public funds and large-scale theft on Wednesday night; if convicted on those charges, he’d face a maximum sentence of 8 years in jail, said police spokesman Henno Kuurmann.
Prime Minister Siim Kallas—who, like Kivi, is from the center-right Reform Party—will decide on accepting her resignation next week; she’ll remain in her post until then, said government spokesman Daniel Vaarik. Her resignation won’t affect the governing coalition, comprised of the Reform Party and center-left Center Party, which is stable, Vaarik said.
Estonia has had the reputation of being less corrupt than other ex-communist states. Vaarik said endowments, which include non-governmental officials on their boards, weren’t as closely monitored as they should be; he said agencies under exclusive government control were less prone to abuses. He added that nothing pointed to Kivi having been involved in any wrongdoing but that her resignation offer “was important in establishing the principle of ministerial responsibility.”
Kivi, a textile artist, is one of five women in the 14-person Cabinet.

LONDON (BNS/REUTERS) British police have started investigation into an incident where a Tuesday night game between first division football teams Crystal Palace and Bradford City saw the coach of Crystal Palace cuff his substitute Latvian goal keeper Alexander Kolinko round the ear for laughing after a goal was lost. The British police told Reuters that they have received a complaint over the incident and that investigation over the common assault claim continues.
The Crystal Palace coach was forced to watch the last 13 minutes of the game from the stands after a third official sent him out of the dug-out for cuffing Kolinko round the ear after a goal scored by Bradford City. Kolinko was on the reserve bench at the time. “I was very disappointed by their goal and when I turned round I saw Kolinko laughing so I cuffed him round the ear. It was only a bit of fun and the view was actually better from the stand,” said coach Trevor Francis on the football team’s homepage after the match.
“The coach hit me hard, not for fun,” Kolinko told Latvian daily Neatkariga Rita Avize. “I think it won’t end so easily for him. We will discuss what to do further with my agent and the club’s management, but actions like this are not permissible. Legal procedures may follow. I don’t know what got over the coach of our club at that moment, but recently he had been acting strangely towards me,” said the Latvian national team’s goalie.
Kolinko has played for Crystal Palace for two seasons, transferring there from Latvia’s Skonto.

TALLINN (CITY PAPER) The Estonian government has offered 280,000 kroons (18,000 dollars) in aid, including firefighters and equipment, to help Russia put out blazes near the Estonian-Russian border.
Westerly winds have blown smoke from the fires into Estonia, creating a haze over the southeastern corner the country. Daniel Vaarik, spokesman for Estonian Prime Minister Siim Kallas, said Estonia wanted to help its large neighbor deal with a humanitarian crisis. “But it’s also threatening us because the smoke’s unhealthy and it’s difficult for some people in the border area to breath,” he said. He said the Cabinet held an extraordinary session late Wednesday specifically to discuss the fires, deciding then to offer Russia aid.
A spokeswoman for the country’s Interior Ministry, which is organizing the assistance, said 30 firemen with expertise in fighting fires in marshy conditions could be sent to Russia within hours. “Right now, we’re just waiting to hear whether Russia will accept our offer,” said Ilona Leib. She said the assistance would include water pumps and fire-fighting vehicles.
Officials discussed the possibility of evacuating Estonians in areas worst affected by the smoke, but decided air quality in the sparsely populated region was still within acceptable health limits, Leib said.
Government spokesman Vaarik said the aid offer to Russia, with which diplomatic relations have sometimes been strained—including over Baltic bids to join the U.S.-led NATO alliance—was a sign of good will. “But this level of cooperation has always been there, certainly when it comes to our rescue services,” he said. “So what we’re doing now isn’t that exceptional.”

Wednesday—August 14, 2002
TALLINN (CITY PAPER) The Baltic states appear caught in the middle of a major dispute between the European Union and the United States over the International Criminal Court that the EU strongly backs and the U.S. opposes. The issue came to the fore Wednesday when Estonia was forced to deny that it—under pressure from Washington—was about to sign an agreement that would grant U.S. troops immunity from prosecution by the court.
Prime Minister Siim Kallas is slated to meet U.S. President George W. Bush at the White House on Sept. 4, and Estonian media initially reported that signing such a deal would top the agenda. Government spokesman Daniel Vaarik confirmed that the U.S. has approached Estonia about signing an agreement, but he said reports that a deal would be sealed when Kallas visits the White House next month were wrong.
The EU has asked candidates not to sign the immunity deals, saying they contradict its backing for the court. Washington opposes the body, fearing its troops could face prosecution for actions in peacekeeping or combat missions. “Estonia is still in the process of formulating its position,” said Vaarik, adding that Washington had not applied pressure on the country. He declined to comment on the EU’s request not to sign.
But Eesti Paevaleht, a leading Estonian daily newspaper, wrote in an editorial Wednesday that officials were clearly torn. “The EU-US confrontation has put Estonia in the position of having to figure out how to go in two directions at once,” it said.
Media reports say that the U.S. has also approached Latvia and Lithuania about signing immunity deals. But government spokesmen in both countries declined any comment on the matter.
The Baltics have made membership in the EU and in the U.S.-led NATO alliance top priorities. They are considered leading candidates to join both prestigious bodies, in part because they’ve succeeded in fostering close relations with both the EU and U.S. This is a rare case where they risk offending one or the other. Paevaleht said that if Estonia agreed to grant U.S. troops immunity, “that could possibly push the door to the EU closed a little.”
Washington failed to get the U.N. Security Council to agree to blanket immunity for American personnel before The Hague-based court and so has sought agreements from individual nations. So far, only Israel and Romania have signed. Vaarik said there’s hope the EU and Washington could arrive at a compromise before Estonia would have to make a final decision itself.

VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) The refusal by French authorities to release the wife of cyclist Raimondas Rumsas, at the center of a Tour de France doping scandal, could damage bilateral relations, Lithuanian Foreign Minister Antanas Valionis said Wednesday. “What we hear every day on TV and radio, and what is being formed in the minds of the Lithuanian people, is far from improving the image of France and French-Lithuanian relations,” BNS quoted him as telling reporters after a meeting with the French embassy’s charge d’affaires, Olivier Poupard.
Rumsas, who placed third in the race last month, fell under scrutiny when his wife, Edita, was detained in France after she was allegedly caught transporting doping products just as the month-long competition ended. She’s been held in jail since. Many Lithuanians say the Rumsases are being treated unfairly, expressing particular anger at the continued detention of Edita Rumsas, whose three children—aged 4, 6 and 8—are now being cared for by relatives in Italy.
Lithuanian Foreign Ministry spokesmen said the meeting with the French diplomat in Vilnius was “very friendly” and that the two sides “discussed how to solve the issue.” They declined to provide further details.
French police said Edita Rumsas was carrying performance-enhancing drugs, including EPO and testosterone. The 30-year-old cyclist said the drugs were intended for his mother-in-law. He was tested for doping four times during the race with all the tests coming up negative. He took another test in neighboring Latvia last week, though it wasn’t sanctioned by the International Cycling Federation. Those results were also negative, according to Lithuanian officials.
He has been called in for questioning by French police but has said he won’t travel to France for fear of being arrested. He has invited French investigators to his home in Italy to question him there.

Tuesday—August 13, 2002
TALLINN (CITY PAPER) Estonia’s annual gross domestic product should expand by a healthy 4.3 percent in 2002 despite a shaky world economy, government officials said Tuesday. Slightly falling exports caused growth to slip to 3.2 percent in the first quarter, but trade should strengthen later this year, decidedly upbeat officials said at the unveiling of a report on the 2001 economy5. “In the first part of this year, we saw some problems,” said Janno Jarve, an analyst at the Economic Ministry. “But things have still gone well, especially given circumstances in the world as a whole.”
Estonia’s economy grew in 2001 by 5.1 percent, which Jarve said bucked the trend of slower growth in most Western European nations. Its performance is underpinned by strong domestic demand, still relatively buoyant export trade and a strictly balanced national budget, said Jarve. Annual inflation this year is expected to hover around 4 percent.
The United States accounts for well under 5 percent of Estonia’s trade, so weaker U.S. demand won’t directly impact Estonia in the short term, added Andrus Saalik, a Finance Ministry analyst; nearby Finland and Sweden are Estonia’s largest trading partners, accounting for almost half this Baltic Sea coast nation’s trade. “If something bad happened in Europe, that would be bad for us,” Saalik said. “But we still wouldn’t feel the consequences until next year.” As of now, he predicted annual growth would rise to 5.5 percent for 2003.
….Relatedly, Washington officials announced Tuesday that U.S. President George W. Bush will meet Estonian Prime Minister Siim Kallas at the White House on September 4. A Bush spokesman said the president wanted to take the opportunity “to recognize the great progress Estonia has made over the past decade in implementing a free-market, democratic transformation.”

VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) A doping test taken by Raimondas Rumsas, the Lithuanian cyclist at the center of a major Tour de France doping controversy, has come back negative, Lithuanian sports officials announced Tuesday. Rumsas flew to neighboring Latvia last week to take the test for banned anabolic steroids, saying he wanted to dispel any doubts about whether he’d cheated; the test wasn’t sanctioned by the International Cycling Federation. “The (results) ascertain that my body is clean of forbidden substances and nobody can accuse me of anything,” Rumsas was quoted as telling BNS.
Officials from the state anti-doping department of Lithuania’s Sports and Physical Education Agency also said the Latvian tests show Rumsas was drug-free and that any accusations to the contrary were unfounded. The Lithuanians added that performance-enhancing steroids remain in the body for at least six months, so, they argued, tests conducted now should be considered credible.
Rumsas, who placed third in the race last month, fell under intense scrutiny when his wife, Edita, was detained in France after she was allegedly caught transporting doping products just as the month-long competition ended. French police said Edita Rumsas was carrying performance-enhancing drugs, including EPO and testosterone. The 30-year-old cyclist was tested for doping four times during the race with all the tests coming up negative. Rumsas said the drugs found by police were intended for his mother-in-law.
He has been called in for questioning by French police but has said he won’t travel to France for fear of being arrested. He has invited French investigators to his home in Italy to question him there.
The affair has angered many Lithuanians, who believe French authorities are mistreating Rumsas and his wife. Some Lithuanians also sharply criticized their own government for not initially doing more to publicly defend the Rumsases.

Monday—August 12, 2002
RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) The Helsinki Stock Exchange on Monday completed its awaited purchase of Latvia’s sole national stock market, the Riga Stock Exchange, securing a 93 percent stake in the company for an undisclosed sum, BNS reported. The Helsinki exchange, or HEX, bought the Tallinn Stock Exchange last year and has also set its sights on Lithuania’s national exchange.
“The aim of the cooperation is to create a well-functioning Latvian securities market infrastructure and increase the visibility of Latvian companies and liquidity of their shares. It is a logical continuation of HEX’s Baltic strategy, which aims to create a well-functioning marketplace for leading Baltic companies,” a joint statement from both sides said earlier.
Latvia’s market, like others in Eastern Europe, has been plagued by low liquidity. Average daily trading volumes in Latvia are tiny, around 7,000 lat (11,000 dollars); the figure in Estonia is a slightly more respectable 16 million kroons (900,000 dollars).
The Helsinki Stock Exchange bought the Tallinn Stock Exchange last year, and the two united after Estonians took the ten-month interval to overhaul their trading procedures. Brokers worldwide who have traded Finnish shares can now trade Estonian shares the same way, from a single terminal. It’s expected that Latvia’s bourse will also fully merge with HEX’s system—though it’s not clear how soon that might happen.
The Helsinki exchange is bidding to increase its influence in the economically dynamic region; its Baltic connections would also help draw money from newly established Baltic pension funds into the Helsinki market.
In 2000, all three Baltic exchanges said they were gearing up to unite with the Nordic Stock Exchange (NOREX), a bitter regional rival of HEX. But those plans quickly unraveled after Estonia’s bourse opted for a friendly buyout by HEX instead.

Friday—August 9, 2002
VILNIUS-RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) Dozens of Lithuanians, including several prominent public figures, gathered in front of the French embassy in Vilnius Friday to protest what they said is the mistreatment of Lithuanian cyclist Raimondas Rumsas and his wife Edita—who have been at the center of a high-profile dopping investigation in France. Rumsas, who came in third at the prestigious Tour de France last month, fell under intense French police and press scrutiny after his wife was allegedly caught transporting doping products just as the tour ended; she’s been in detention in France since.
Over 50 Lithuanians at the embassy held placards denouncing French authorities. One read, “Bring mother back to her children;” the Rumsases have three children, now being cared for by relatives in Italy. Others called for a boycott of French goods. Last week Lithuania’s main daily newspaper, Lietuvos Rytas, said in an editorial that the jailing of Rumsas’ wife “appears to be an attempt to crucify him, especially since he is an upstart from a country without influence….It is difficult to dispel suspicions that the Lithuanian’s third place finish spoiled business for someone who is very powerful.”
Also on Friday, Latvian officials confirmed that Rumsas flew to Latvia from Italy this week to take a new dopping test for anabolic steroids. The tests were done at the initiative of Lithuanian government authorities who said they wanted to help prove the cyclist’s innocence; the International Cycling Federation did not sanction the tests. Results were expected to be released sometime next week.
French police said Edita Rumsas had been carrying performance-enhancing drugs, including EPO and testosterone, in her car. Raimondas Rumsas was tested for doping four times during the race with all the tests coming up negative. The 30-year-old said the drugs found by police were intended for his mother-in-law. He has been called in for questioning by French police, but has said he won’t travel to France for fear of his being arrested. He has invited French investigators to his home in Italy to question him there.

Thursday—August 8, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) The Lithuanian capital Thursday authorized emergency funds to save ailing cherry trees planted to honor a Japanese diplomat who helped rescue thousands of Jews during the Holocaust. Officials said the 100 white-blossom cherry trees, or sakuras—planted last year to mark the 100th anniversary of Chiune Sugihara’ birth—haven’t received enough water during a current drought and could die.
The Vilnius municipal government said they would allocate 2,000 litas, some 600 dollars, a month for a private company to water the trees, shipped from Japan and replanted on the banks of the Neris River in central Vilnius. Temperatures in Lithuania topped 35 degrees Celsius (95 degrees Fahrenheit) last month, possibly damaging some sakuras irrevocably, experts said.
Sugihara, Japan’s deputy consul general in Lithuania, defied his own government by issuing over 6,000 visas to stranded Jewish refugees desperate to travel abroad before an impending Nazi invasion. He died in 1986, aged 86.

Wednesday—August 7, 2002
RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) Latvian Minister of Culture Karina Petersone said the UN’s cultural branch should include the massive song festivals held every couple of years in each of the Baltic states on its prestigious heritage list, BNS reported. She urged Baltic governments to join lobbying efforts to get on the so called UNESCO Cultural Heritage List. Petersone, speaking at a UNESCO seminar in Riga, said the three countries would likely apply for the distinction by August 31 this year.
Inclusion on the list could help the countries qualify for financial help in preserving the more than century-old song festivals, which typically involve several hundred thousands spectators and over 10,000 singers.
(For more information about UNESCO and the heritage list, go to www.unesco.org .)

Tuesday—August 6, 2002
TALLINN (BNS-CITY PAPER) The Estonian government Tuesday named January 27—the anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Nazi concentration camp—as official Holocaust Day, BNS reported. According to a Ministry of Education statement, its observance would foster understanding of genocide and would underline “as an important foreign policy factor, solidarity with the European and transatlantic community.” Both the European Union and NATO have urged the Baltic states to devote more resources to Holocaust education.

Monday—August 5, 2002
RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) Latvian police have begun investigating allegations that a patient died after refusing to give in to a demand to pay a bribe in exchange for treatment, according to a BNS review of weekend Latvian newspapers. The report said the patient reportedly died at Riga’s Stradins Hospital, though other details weren’t immediately available. Latvian authorities have recently said they intend to crack down all forms of corruption, though critics have said the campaign hasn’t been effective so far.

RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) Moscow’s nationalist mayor, Yuri Luzhkov, who has frequently lashed out at Baltic policies, is slated to visit Riga in late September, BNS reported Monday. An invitation was extended to Luzhkov, a one-time Russian presidential candidate, by Riga Mayor Gundars Boyars last year. Luzhkov and a delegation of Russian businessmen are expected to visit for two days starting September 27, though no firm itinerary has yet been set. While Latvia has called for more such high level visits, they have been relatively rare.

Thursday—August 1, 2002
RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) A fringe left-wing group, notorious for having once taken over a church in Riga, has struck again—this time throwing a pie in the face of prominent politician and famed pop music composer Raimonds Pauls. BNS reported that the incident occurred Wednesday night at a music festival near Riga, just before Pauls was preparing to go on stage. Police arrested two members of the Russian-dominated National Bolsheviks, which advocates the restoration of the Soviet Union, and they were expected to spend at least 15 days in detention.
Pauls, a pop hero in Latvia and in Russia for scores of hits he penned during the Soviet era, was also a leading candidate for president several years ago. His pie-wielding assailants reportedly told journalists that they were protesting his plans to join the center-right, Latvian-dominated People’s Party—saying he was “betraying” local Russians by doing so.
In 2000, three Russian citizens and members of the National Bolsheviks were arrested and later jailed for briefly occupying and threatening to blow up Riga’s St. Peter’s Church with what turned out to be a fake grenade. One sympathizer of the organization also hit Britain’s Prince Charles across the face with a flower during his visit to the Latvian capital last year, saying she was protesting the war in Afghanistan and Baltic bids to join NATO. She was jailed for several days.

Wednesday—July 31, 2002
KAUNAS (BNS-CITY PAPER) Patches of city parks in Kaunas, Lithuania’s second largest city, are becoming overgrown with marijuana plants because the cash-strapped local government can’t maintain the areas, BNS reported Wednesday. “Kaunas is not allocated enough funds for mowing currently, so various vegetation is thriving in green areas of the city, including cannabis plants,” Arunas Mockaitis of the city’s Environmental Protection Department was quoted as telling BNS. He said the pesky plants appear to have spread naturally to the parks and not as the result of any illicit activity. Police, nevertheless, have launched an investigation.

Tuesday—July 30, 2002
RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) A 15-year-old Latvian citizen was among those killed in an airshow tragedy in Lviv, Ukraine Saturday that left 83 spectators dead, BNS reported. The girl, whose name was not given, reportedly had family in Ukraine; she had been securing a residence permit in Lviv but kept her Latvian citizenship.
The accident occurred when an SU-27 UB fighter performing a stunt crashed into the ground then cart-wheeled into a crowd. The dead included some 25 children.

Friday—July 26, 2002
TALLINN (BNS-CITY PAPER) Baltic stock exchanges finally flinched in reaction to world markets this week, with the Estonian bourse taking a particularly tough beating Thursday and Friday, according to BNS. While Riga and Vilnius shed several percentage points over the period, the Tallinn Stock Exchange plummeted 10 percent; it directly mirrored the downward slide of Estonia’s dominant blue-chip company Hansapank, whose shares sunk 10 percent over the week.
But analysts say the falls have almost nothing to do with economic fundamentals in the region—which remain strong—and were prompted almost entirely by mayhem on Western exchanges. Key area companies, including Hansapank—the largest bank by far in the Baltic states— have reported strong earnings this year and have also sounded bullish about next year. Hansapank’s share price now stands at 184 kroons, down from 205 kroons a week ago. Analysts told BNS that buyers were likely to see its stock as a bargain as trading opens Monday.

Thursday—July 25, 2002
RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) Latvian Television has named Riga’s Skonto Hall as the venue for the 2002 Eurovision Song Contest, which the country won the right to host after its entrant, Marija Naumova, triumphed in Tallinn earlier in the year. Latvia’s executive producer of the event, Arvids Babris, said Skonto Hall met the stringent requirements for the technically complicated show. He added that it was also one of the best candidates from a security point of view, saying police had weighed in strongly in its favor. He said another location organizers had looked at was Riga’s Kipsala Fair Center; some press reports said a sports hall in the seaside city of Ventspils had also been under consideration.
The center is named after the Skonto conglomerate that helped finance the facility. The company, with 100 million dollars annually in sales in recent years, is also linked to the country’s best known soccer team, FC Skonto Riga.
The Eurovision Song Contest, which is annually watched by as many as 300 million TV viewers around the world, will be the biggest international event ever held in this Baltic Sea state. Many Latvians see it as a rare opportunity for the country to shine in the world spotlight—and to raise awareness about Latvia abroad.
(For further background about Latvia’s Eurovision victory and to follow the preparations for the 2002 Contest over the coming year, see CITY PAPER’s Eurovision website…here.)

Wednesday—July 24, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) A Lithuanian professor proposed a novel solution to a dispute over how residents of the Russian Kaliningrad enclave could access Russia once the outpost is surrounded by the European Union. Dig a tunnel, he says.
The Belgium-sized territory is sandwiched between Lithuania and Poland, both of which are expected to join the EU by 2004, and Moscow fears it will become cut off, damaging its economy and causing hardships for its million inhabitants.
Algimantas Ambrazevicius, who teaches science at the Lithuanian War Academy, explained Wednesday that a 70-kilometer-long tunnel could be dug under Poland to give Kaliningrad residents easy access to their Russian homeland. Ambrazevicius, who said he recently sent details of the plan to Russian President Vladimir Putin, likened the would-be tunnel to the 50-kilometer Channel Tunnel linking Britain and France.
The EU and Russia began their first direct talks about Kaliningrad’s future status Wednesday in Brussels. The EU, as Poland and Lithuania, oppose Kremlin calls for Kaliningraders to be granted visa-free travel through EU territory. Ambrazevicius said Poland shouldn’t be inclined to ask for visas from travelers using the tunnel since they wouldn’t have the chance to actually step onto Polish territory above ground. One of the EU concerns about granting Kaliningrad visa-free travel in the future is that some Russians could then settle illegally elsewhere in the EU.
The professor said the tunnel would take up to three years and 2 billion dollars to construct. It would run from Poland, skirting Lithuania’s southern border, to Belarus—a close Kremlin ally that doesn’t require visas for Russian citizens. Trains, he added, would carry passengers through the tunnel, and to and from Russia proper—500 kilometers east of the Belarus-Polish border.
This is not the first time tunnels have been suggested as a way to facilitate travel in the region. Several years ago an Estonian engineer suggested constructing a tunnel from Tallinn to Helsinki, some 80 kilometers under the Baltic Sea, to improve tourist and economic links.

RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) The Baltic states were named in the UN’s annual development report as “most-developed countries” for the first time, BNS reported Wednesday. Rating 173 countries according to criteria such as per capita GDP, literacy, life expectancy and the strength of democratic institutions, it put Estonia in 42nd, Lithuania in 49th place and Latvia 53rd on the list. Norway, as last year, topped the survey, followed by Sweden, Canada, Belgium. Australia and the United States. Virtually all the nations at the very bottom of the list were in sub-Saharan Africa. Sierra Leone had the dubious distinction of being in the dead last, No. 173 spot.

TALLINN (CITY PAPER) World boxing champion Lenox Lewis spent two days vacationing in Estonia this week, newspapers reported Wednesday. Lewis arrived in Tallinn by ferry from Helsinki on Sunday; he spent one day in Tallinn and one in the seaside resort town of Parnu before departing on a private plane with an entourage of 16 people, according to the Ohtuleht daily. Photographs in the newspaper showed him signing autographs in Parnu, including at a local boxing club for boys. Ohtuleht quoted Lewis as saying he enjoyed his stay. “I definitely want to come back,” he said.

Tuesday—July 23, 2002
FRANCE (BNS-CITY PAPER) Lithuanian Raimondas Rumsas is vying to make history as he battles to stay among the top three as the prestigious Tour de France heads into its final stages. The 30-year-old Rumsas, in third place as of Tuesday, is on the verge of making the best showing ever by a Baltic rider in the French bicycle race—one of the most closely watched sports events of the year in Europe. He was some six minutes behind the leader, American Lance Armstrong, and about two minutes behind the second place Joseba Beloki of Spain.
Many observers pegged Rumsas as a favorite for second place but odds were still strongly in favor of Armstrong grabbing his fourth consecutive title. “My objective before the start was to finish on the podium and I hope it happens,” Rumsas told Reuters. “I’d also like to win a stage but a place on the podium in Paris is my big goal.”
Several other Baltic bicyclists also made their mark on the 2002 Tour de France, with Latvia’s Raivis Belohvosciks appearing in the top third of the pack earlier. Estonia’s Jaan Kirsipuu, considered one of the top sprinters in the world, won an early stage of the race.
The Tour de France ends on July 28.
(To follow the progress of the race, see www.tourdefrance.com.)

TALLINN (CITY PAPER) Estonia’s government sacked the country’s No. 2 Foreign Ministry official Tuesday after he allegedly yelled at his immediate superior during a staff meeting and a week after he was fined for drunk driving. Deputy Foreign Minister Indrek Tarand, in charge of the day-to-day running of the ministry since 1994, feuded for months with Foreign Minister Kristiina Ojuland, the first woman to hold the post. But Ojuland said a last straw was when Tarand shouted at her at a recent working retreat for ministry staff, and she asked the Cabinet to fire him. The 38-year-old Tarand was stopped by police for drunk driving two weeks ago, an incident also cited by Ojuland as a reason to let him go; he had been driving an official car.
Ministry spokesmen declined comment on the ministerial tiff. But reports said the acrimony originated years ago when Ojuland, then a lower-level diplomat, was discharged by Tarand; she said the dismissal was improper and a court later agreed. Most newspapers sided with Ojuland, 35, saying Tarand was wrong to challenge his boss and that his behavior threatened to damage the reputation of what has been regarded as one of Estonia’s best run ministries.
Tarand told BNS that he might consider challenging the legality of Tuesday’s decision. “It’s a pity my eight and a half years of work with the Foreign Ministry ended in such a regrettable manner,” he was quoted as saying.

TALLINN (CITY PAPER-BNS) Estonian police said Tuesday they found no evidence that any men on a list of war-crime suspects provided by Nazi-hunters participated in the Holocaust during World War II. The 16 Estonians on the list, received from the Nazi-hunting Simon Wiesenthal Center earlier this month, belonged to Germany’s 36th Police Battalion. “We found no evidence against these men. There was also no evidence that the 36th Battalion took part in any crimes,” said Henno Kuurmann, spokesman for the Estonian Security Police that carried out the investigation.
The apparent exoneration of the 36th Battalion contradicted a recent report by an Estonian presidential commission that found there was “compelling” proof it helped liquidate a Jewish ghetto in Novogrudok, Belarus, on Aug. 7, 1942. The head of the Wiesenthal Center’s Jerusalem office, Efraim Zuroff, sharply criticized Estonian investigators for appearing to clear the battalion. “It’s obvious this investigation was carried out in a totally incompetent and unprofessional manner,” he said. In a statement to BNS, U.S. Embassy spokesman Thomas Hodges also called the findings into question, pointing to the same contradiction with the president’s report.
The Estonian Security Police said the majority of suspects on the list—most of whom would have been in their late 70s or 80s—have long since died; it added that none of the others who might be alive currently reside in Estonia.
(You can read the Estonian president’s report on the German occupation at http://www.historycommission.ee/temp/conclusions.htm)

Monday—July 22, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) Lithuanian officials have again reported one of the world’s highest suicide rates, with as many as five people a day taking their own lives in the country. In 2001, 1,533 Lithuanians took their lives, equivalent to 44 suicides per 100,000 people; that’s nearly double the rate in 1990. The average suicide rate in the European Union is 20 per 100,000.
Lithuania has sparked major economic growth since shrugging off communism. But new wealth has spread unevenly, with many elderly and farmers benefiting little from post-Soviet market reforms. Out of the over 17,000 Lithuanians who have killed themselves over the past decade, 82 percent were men, officials said. People living in the poorer countryside were also more likely to take their own lives.
Other nations with high suicide rates include neighboring Russia, with 39 suicides per 100,000 people and Estonia, with 32 per 100,000, the report said.

Friday—July 19, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) Lithuanian officials made an unlikely appeal Friday for Britain’s BBC and France’s AFP news agency not to confuse “Lithuania” with “Latvia.” BNS quoted Lithuanian Deputy Foreign Minister Justas Vincas Paleckis as saying he sent letters to the two media companies after they ran stories saying Lithuania was on a United Nations list of countries that have violated an arms embargo on Somalia; Lithuanian officials said the UN list actually named Latvia, not Lithuania. Paleckis reportedly wrote that he hope the BBC and AFP will correct “this sorrowful mistake” and remain “loyal to the principles of information objectivity and accuracy” in future dispatches. In a statement, the Lithuanian Foreign Ministry said such false reports “harm the country’s image, as well as understanding and trust between people and nations.”

RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) All kinds of things have gone into famed matrushka dolls, from depictions of Kremlin leaders and Bill Gates to now, alas, vodka. BNS reported Friday that Latvian police discovered 25,000 of bottles of contraband vodka each inside a large-sized version of the traditional Russian toy. The liquor, under the brand name Slavjanskaya Vodka, arrived at the port of Riga from Russia. No arrests were reported and Latvian police were working with their Russian counterparts to track down those responsible.

MOSCOW (AFP-BNS) Russian President Vladimir Putin receives a taunting letter from a Chechen rebel named Shamil and, armed with a big gun, decides to go down to the rebel republic to defend his country’s honor. Or so says Russia’s latest spy novel “The President,” by a retired Latvian journalist who lives near Riga; it depicts the Kremlin chief eventually biting the rebel commander’s neck in a bloody climax to the book, which critics charge of adding to Putin’s growing personality cult. “I wanted him to go into Chechnya alone, with a gun, to help develop Putin’s image of a real fighter,” journalist and author Alexander Olbik told the Izvestia daily.
Olbik has earlier worked on a novel on former president Boris Yeltsin. His book was published in Ukraine after the Kremlin protested over the use of Putin’s image in such a graphic novel. “He’s no Rambo, he’s no hero,” Olbik said in a separate interview with the English-language daily The Moscow Times. “He’s just a ordinary fighter. I don’t make him a hero.”
The Kremlin has in recent weeks been forced to defend itself against charges that it is feeding a personality cult around Putin, who faces re-election in 2004. Critics point to the activities of pro-presidential youth group Moving Together, a shadowy movement whose supporters, mostly teenagers, wear T-shirts bearing Putin’s image.

Wednesday—July 17, 2002
TALLINN (BNS-CITY PAPER) More than 170,000 mostly Russian-speaking residents of Estonia don’t have citizenship of any country, BNS quoted the Citizenship and Migration Board as saying Wednesday. Out of a population of 1.4 million, another 97,000 are citizens of other countries, the vast majority of them carrying Russian passports.
In total, there are about 500,000 Russian speakers in Estonia, most of whom immigrated here during the Soviet era; less than half of them have received Estonian citizenship since the Soviet collapse.
The citizenship issue has occasionally soured relations with the Kremlin, which has said Estonia’s citizenship requirements are too stringent.

Tuesday—July 16, 2002
RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) Owners of Japanese jeeps in Latvia need to keep especially good tabs on their cars, according to a Tuesday report by BNS that named Toyota Land Cruisers and Mitsubishi Pajeros a favorite target of thieves. BNS quoted police as saying that 30 Japanese-made luxury jeeps have been stolen in the country so far this year, most of them in Riga. In total, police said that 1,200 cars were pilfered in the first five months of the year. At the same time, police Monday also announced that the overall crime rate has decreased by 2 percent in Latvia since 2001; in Riga, the rate has fallen by almost 3 percent.

Friday—July 12, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) One of Lithuania’s most celebrated poets of the 20th century, Bernardas Brazdzionis, has died at his home in Los Angeles, his granddaughter Dalyte Lovett announced Friday. BNS said he died the day before after a long illness; he was 96.
Many considered Brazdzionis, who emigrated to the West as the Soviet Union occupied Lithuania in 1944, “the patriarch of Lithuanian émigré poetry” and “knowledge of Brazdzionis’ poetry can be taken as a litmus test for one’s degree of patriotism,” according to Lithuania: In Her Own Words, a 1997 compilation of Lithuanian literature.
While Brazdzionis was already an established poet during Lithuania’s first period of independence, his stature increased in exile. “He reacted to exile with fiercely patriotic verse in which the outrage against the injustice to his nation and the defiance of tyranny were raised to a highly emotional, almost hysterical pitch,” wrote Lithuanian literary critic Rimvydas Silbajoris. “Many of his poems centered around the image of a weary traveler with the burden of injustice on his back and the jewel of faith in his heart, calling to God at all the crossroads of the world.”
Brazdzionis published some 50 books and poetry collections during his lifetime. In 1998, he was awarded the First Class Order of Lithuanian Grand Duke Gediminas, one of the country’s highest state medals.
Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus sent his condolences to the family of Brazdionis on Friday, BNS reported. The agency said he would likely be buried in Kaunas, Lithuania’s second largest city, but that no funeral date had been set.
Read Brazdzionis’ poetry at www.efn.org/~valdas/brazdzionis.html.

SONKAJARVI, Finland (CITY PAPER) Estonians are once again savoring victory in a sport in which they have become acknowledged world masters: wife carrying. Estonian husband and wife Mellis Tammre and Anna Zilberberg grabbed the tenth annual World Wife-Carrying Championship title in Sonkajarvi, Finland over the weekend—making it five straight victories for Estonians in the unlikely but increasingly popular event. The competition, widely covered by international media, involved husbands carrying their wives around a 254-meter course that included hurdles and chest-high water pools. Some 6,000 people watched 36 couples take part in the event in the small Finnish town as Tammre and Zilberberg edged out a second place Finnish team; Americans, Norwegians, Dutch and Britons also took part. The most favored style for carrying wives is with the women upside down and her thighs gripping the man’s head and her arms wrapped around his stomach; the technique, developed by previous Estonian champions, has been dubbed “the Estonia carry.”

TALLINN (BNS-CITY PAPER) A high-ranking Estonian Foreign Ministry official was stopped for drunk driving in his ministerial car on Friday, BNS reported. Police said long-time Foreign Ministry Chancellor Indrek Tarand was seen at 5 a.m. driving erratically on a Tallinn street and pulled over. Foreign Minister Kristiina Ojuland told BNS that she hadn’t yet received a formal report on the affair but that “no doubt it is an extremely regrettable incident.” Tarand himself was quoted by BNS as saying he was embarrassed. “It was a great blow to my relatives and friends who have trusted me,” he said. “I very much regret what happened and this is not going to ever happen again.” Tarand, who had been expected to take up an ambassadorship in Portugal after reportedly feuding with Foreign Minister Ojuland earlier this year, will face an administrative court within the next two weeks.

Thursday—July 11, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) The Nazi-hunting Simon Wiesenthal Center has announced a 10,000-dollar cash reward for anyone with evidence that might lead to the conviction of participants in the Holocaust, BNS reported. The initiative, dubbed “Operation Last Chance,” was launched during a visit this week to all three Baltic states by the Wiesenthal Center’s Efraim Zuroff. The Center has in the past said that the Baltic states have not done enough to track down and prosecute those who played a part in killing Jews during World War II; Baltic official have said they have done everything they could do and that most war criminals from the region either were prosecuted or have long since died. Zuroff, one of the staunchest critics of Baltic authorities over the years, told a news conference in Vilnius earlier this week that the program was a “the last opportunity for both Nazi-hunters and Lithuania.” He singled out Lithuanian-born Algimantas Dailide as a prime candidate for prosecution and said the cash-for-evidence scheme could flush out enough material to secure a guilty verdict against the 81-year-old, who is fighting deportation in his adopted American homeland. Ads were expected to be run in all three Baltics laying down the terms of “Operation Last Chance.”

Other news items from recent weeks:

TALLINN (BNS-CITY PAPER) An Estonian naval officer killed his family and then committed suicide on June 25—in one of the most brutal murders of its kind in Estonia in recent years. Lieutenant Sergei Hokhlov, 34, used his 9mm Makarov pistol—issued to him by the navy— to kill his wife, mother and his 6-year-old son around midnight after going off duty at his nearby base, according to BNS. Investigators said he called police to report the murders at his Tallinn home and then shot himself in the head. A suicide note by his body read, “I’m leaving this life and I’m taking my loved ones with me.” No clear motive has been found for the killings, though some newspapers reported that Hokhlov and his wife had recently argued over the family’s finances.

RIGA (BNS-CITY PAPER) Two African musicians living in Riga, Peter Mensah and Christopher Ejugo, have said they are taking the small rightwing Freedom Party to court after being tricked into appearing in an anti-European Union/anti-immigration TV ad that many observers said was racist. The ad featured one of the two black artists from the Riga-based Los Amigos band dressed in a soldier’s uniform and kissing a Latvian girl. Text on the screen read, “Today he defends your country, tomorrow he may become your son-in-law.” The men said they had been told they were being filmed for a pro-EU advertisement and that they were shocked when they saw it aired. The ad ran just twice on Latvian TV on June 21 before being pulled and denounced by the station management; managers said they hadn’t been aware of the content of the ad. Latvian President Vaira Vike-Freiberga and other politicians also strongly condemned the clip. If producers of the Freedom Party ad are convicted of libel and violating an individuals’ human rights, they could face a maximum penalty of ten years in prison.

Monday—June 17, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) Several top Lithuanian politicians expressed outrage after pro-Tibetan activists were detained briefly as Chinese President Jiang Zemin arrived here for a two day state visit Sunday night. At least 10 people, some of them holding anti-Chinese placards and waving Tibetan flags, were detained at the Vilnius international airport just before Zemin’s plane touched down, presidential spokeswoman Violeta Gaizauskaite said. Lithuanian Television showed other protesters with Tibetan flags by an airport road being forced bg police to sit down as Zemin’s motorcade passed by; other activists said they were held on a bus for four hours in downtown Vilnius.
Prominent writer and Tibetan supporter Jurga Ivanauskaite told Lithuanian Television she was among those detained while walking in the city. She said four policemen “dragged” her onto the bus, but never explained why. She said the action was reminescent of Soviet police tactics during 50 years of Moscow rule.
Gaizauskaite said President Valdas Adamkus called police officials Monday to convey his displeasure at the arrests and to demanded an investigation into the detentions. Opposition leader Vytautas Landsbergis also denounced police. “I believe that the dignity of Lithuania as a state and authority was considerably undermined due to the orders issued to police,” BNS quoted him as saying. He also called for a full investigation
Many Lithuanians, Latvians and Estonians express sympathy for Tibet, occupied by China in 1950, saying its plight echoes their own occupation by the Soviet Union. But Baltic governments want to forge closer economic ties and so have bent over backwards not to criticize China’s human rights record.
Zemin left Lithuania Monday night; he was in Latvia and Estonia earlier in the week.

Friday—June 14, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-AFP) Former Olympic discus champion Romas Ubartas has been temporarily suspended by the Lithuanian athletics federation following allegations of anabolic steroid use, the federation secretary said this week.
Ubartas, 41, who won gold at the 1992 Barcelona Games, tested positive for anabolic steroids at a training camp in the United States in April and will not be able to compete until the final results from the International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF) are received.
Both doping tests Ubartas took in early spring were positive but he took two more in May and is now awaiting results.
Ubartas currently ranks 33rd among world discus throwers.
Ubartas, who won Lithuania’s first Olympic gold medal since regaining independence from Moscow, had already been suspended for four years after testing positive for steroids in 1993.
The athlete, who planned to end his career as a sportsman at the end of this season, is faced with disqualification for life.

TALLINN (BNS) The Estonian Statistics Office said that the average monthly wage in the country was 5,510 kroons (some 330 dollars) according to figures compiled form 2001, BNS reported. It was a 12 percent rise from the year before. The highest average wage was reported to be in the financial sector—some 12,300 kroons a month. Wages were lowest in agriculture, with workers making some 3,290 kroons a month on average.

Wednesday—June 12, 2002
VILNIUS (BNS-CITY PAPER) Several thousands inmates in Lithuania have gone on hunger strike to demand that authorities do more to stem an outbreak of the HIV virus that causes AIDS—and to improve general conditions within the prison system, BNS reported. Some 5,400 out of 11,000 prisoners at the country’s four largest jails kept refusing meals Wednesday after beginning their protest the day before.
Tensions rose two weeks ago after 232 of 1,727 prisoners at Alytus, 100 kilometers southwest of Vilnius, tested positive for HIV. The results jolted Lithuania, which has for years claimed it had Europe’s lowest HIV rate—with around 300 HIV cases on record before the prisoners were tested or less than 0.1 percent of the 3.5 million population.
Officials have boasted that Lithuania wasted little time ten years ago setting up condom distribution programs and supplying free needles to drug addicts to prevent the most common means of transmitting the deadly disease. But other observers, while praising Lithuania’s prevention programs, have long cautioned that national HIV figures don’t always reflect the full scale of the problem since many virus carriers are never tested.
The U.N. Program on HIV/AIDS reported that Ukraine had Europe’s highest HIV rate with around 1 percent of its 50 million population infected as of last year; over 35 percent of the population in Botswana carry HIV. It said Lithuania had under 500 carriers in 2000 but didn’t give an exact number. As of last year, more than 40 million people worldwide either have AIDS or carry the HIV virus— half of them in sub-Saharan Africa, the U.N. body reported.
Lithuania’s state AIDS center has said the HIV virus was spreading in the prison community mainly because of intravenous drug use. Inmates have reportedly said they’ll keep refusing food until their demands are met; others have called for a freeze on the transfer of inmates from Alytus to other prisons.
Experts say AIDS/HIV rates, while still relatively low compared to most other countries, have been rising fast in all three Baltic states—and that they are likely to continue increasing at a similar pace. BNS reported that Estonia, with a population of 1.4 million, officially has 2,350 HIV carriers—with 461 being reported only this year.

Tuesday—June 11, 2002
LUXEMBOURG (BNS-CITY PAPER) Lithuania has agreed with the European Union to close the ex-Soviet republic’s sole nuclear plant by 2009—sweeping away the main obstacle to its EU membership—BNS reported.
A declaration committing Lithuania to the shutdown was signed Tuesday in Luxemburg during accession talks with the EU, which had said the Soviet-built plant was a threat and made its closure a condition of membership, BNS said. It quoted Lithuanian Foreign Minister Antanas Valionis as saying in Luxembourg that while the EU promised to help pay the cost of closing the plant, the exact sum would be determined later. “Today’s agreement opens opportunities to launch specific negotiations on financial matters, namely on the financial assistance program intended to fund the plants closer,” he was quoted as saying. The cash-strapped Lithuania government earlier estimated the process will cost some 3 billion euros (2.8 billion dollars.)
Valionis said the Tuesday agreement, part of a wider Lithuanian-EU discussions on energy issues, now freed Lithuania to concentrate on other outstanding questions related to its longstanding membership bid. “We will now be able to focus on other important matters like agriculture or budgetary stipulations,” he was quoted as saying. Lithuania has said it wants to finish its membership talks this year and enter the EU by 2004. The nuclear issue aside, the EU has said pro-West, pro-reform Lithuania is a leading candidate.
Ignalina, 130 kilometers (80 miles) northeast of Vilnius, the capital, provides over 70 percent of Lithuania’s electricity and some critics say closing it will cause steep hikes in the cost of electricity and hurt the economy. The plant’s two reactors are the same type as those at Chernobyl, Ukraine _ site of the world’s worst nuclear accident in 1986 _ though they have had safety upgrades since this Baltic Sea coast nation broke with the Soviet Union in 1991.
The government earlier pledged to switch off the first reactor by 2005, but, until now, seemed reluctant about promising to shut down the second. Many Lithuanians, including some prominent politicians, oppose its closure.

Monday—June 10, 2002
TALLINN (CITY PAPER) Ex-U.S. President Bill Clinton, in the Baltic states for the first time since he left office, strongly backed their inclusion in NATO, saying it would solve the historically vulnerable region’s security concerns. In a keynote address Monday at an economic forum in Tallinn, Estonia’s capital, he told some 500 business and political leaders that the staunchly pro-West Baltics had done what they needed to do and “earned their place in NATO.” “Do you need a defense? Yes you do,” he said. “But all you really need to do is to stay in NATO. Once you get in, everybody else pledges themselves to your defense. That’s the best guarantee you could have.”
The former president hastened to add that he didn’t think Russia was a threat to its neighbors under Russian President Vladimir Putin, saying that “for now, the Russians have decided to be partners with the West.” Clinton, who helped pressure Russia in the mid-1990s to finally withdraw tens of thousands of Red Army troops from the fledging Baltics, also reserved praise for then-Russian President Boris Yeltsin. “I know it’s fashionable to degrade Yeltsin because he was a man of some extravagant habits,” he said. “But he was a genuine democrat….He came to literally loathe communism.”
Clinton also reminisced about meeting an Estonian on a train when he traveled to Russia as a 23-year-old in 1969; he said the man had been a leading boxing coach in Estonia prior to the Soviet takeover in 1940. Clinton said he shrugged off as impossible the Estonian’s insistence that his homeland would one day be free of Moscow rule. “He turned out to be right,” the ex-president said. (Clinton added that Estonian officials had handed him the man’s name, Peeter Motsov, just minutes before he gave his Monday address; he said Motsov had apparently died around 1980.)
The one-day Tallinn forum was sponsored by the U.S. computer maker IBM and Estonia’s Äripäev daily. It was Clinton’s first visit to this the Baltic Sea coast nation—though he visited the neighboring Latvia as president in 1994. Most participants at the Tallinn forum paid 15,000 kroons (900 dollars) to hear Clinton speak. Organizers declined to disclose his speaker’s fee—though the local ETA news agency said it was 2.5 million kroons (150,000 dollars).
Another ex-president, Estonia’s Lennart Meri, took Clinton on a walking tour of Tallinn’s old town earlier Monday, occasionally stopping along the narrow cobblestone streets to speak with well-wishers. They later sat down for coffee at an outdoor cafe on the sunny, unseasonably warm day. In the morning, Clinton briefly met current President Arnold Rüütel at the Estonian presidential palace. Clinton reportedly arrived in Tallinn Sunday and was scheduled leave Monday evening.

Friday—June 7, 2002
TALLINN (CITY PAPER) Estonian firemen, heralded for their bravery in putting out fires, are now winning accolades for a less conventional sort of rescue operation: saving toads. Fire trucks in the southwest part of the country, suffering a two-month drought, have been delivering eight tons of water daily to several breeding ponds of the endangered natterjack toad, officials said Friday.
The operation is focusing on some 15,000 tadpoles of the rare toad species, hatched earlier this spring, that will die if the small sandpit reservoirs dry up, according to one environmental official involved, Mati Kose. “If they die, it’d be a disaster,” said Kose, adding that there were just 500-2000 adult natterjacks left in Estonia. “This toad is near extinction, and this tiny part of Estonia is one of its last strongholds.” Natterjacks, or Bufo calamita by their Latin name, live in several other northern European nations but are also under threat in those countries.
The greenish brown reptile, the size of a fist, is celebrated here for its high metallic croak that can be heard 2 kilometers away. Kose said many Estonians in rural areas were nostalgic about the sound, associating it with their childhood. He said some tourist guides bring groups of people to the area at night to listen to the toad calls.
The adult toads have already been gathered up with spoons and glass jars and moved to wetter areas. But it is impossible to transport the tadpoles until they mature and can survive out of the water, according to Kose. Fire engines from Haademeeste village, 170 kilometers south of Tallinn, have been spraying water into the pits for two weeks and are expected to continue for two more—when the tadpoles should be developed toads with legs. Kose said numbers of natterjacks, which thrive in sandy marshes near the sea, plummeted over recent decades because human developments overran their habitats.

Thursday—June 6, 2002
RIGA (CITY PAPER) Latvia has said it is committed to staging the Eurovision Song Contest next year—flatly dismissing suggestions that it might not have the cash or wherewithal to pull it off. said it is committed to staging the Eurovision Song Contest next year—flatly dismissing suggestions that it might not have the cash or wherewithal to pull it off. The government this week pledged that it would provide the needed funds to the state-owned Latvijas Television that will have to produce the show, saying it would guarantee at least 2.7 million dollars to stage the 47-year-old contest. Latvia is economically dynamic but still cash-strapped and some wondered whether it could afford to put on the extravaganza—which will cost at least 7 million dollars, half of which must be paid by the host nation. Officials said they were drafting a written letter to the European Broadcasting Union, which oversees the Song Contest, confirming that it will put on the extravaganza and that the note will be delivered by a June 10 deadline.
Latvia won the right to host Eurovision after its entry, Marija Naumova, dramatically won the contest on May 25 in Estonia—which had won in 2001. Naumova sang a Latin-tinged dance tune called “I Wanna.” Latvians rejoiced at the Eurovision triumph, streaming onto Riga’s city streets waving flags and cheering. Naumova received a heroine’s welcome when she arrived back in Latvia, greeted by the president and thousands of well-wishers.
Many Latvians that believe hosting the event will be a PR opportunity of a lifetime for the country, helping to raise Latvians international profile and boost tourism. While some media abroad have reported that Latvians see the obligation to host Eurovision as a curse—that seemed far from the truth in Latvia, where average citizens to government leaders have said they are thrilled at the opportunity. It will be the largest international event of its kind ever staged by Latvia; Estonia was the first ex-communist state to host Eurovision, watched by as many as 300 million viewers worldwide.
Questions still remain about a possible venue for Eurovision 2003, with no obvious choices. Estonia had luckily just completed a new 10,000-seat stadium in Tallinn when it won Eurovision in 2001. But Latvia has no such facility. Speculation has focused on the outdoor Skonto sports stadium in Riga and an arena in the wealthy port city of Ventspils; others have suggested holding the event on Riga’s old town Dome square, though covering the cobblestone quarter with a tent could be technically tricky. Organizers say that having to prepare a venue for the event, including the possibility of having to construct a tent over an outdoor site, could raise their costs by a million dollars or more.

Monday—June 3, 2002
TALLINN-RIGA-VILNIUS (CITY PAPER) Analysis: Baltic city centers under development pressure—A new, multi-million-dollar main street cutting through freshly built skyscrapers and near Tallinn’s Stock Exchange was supposed to be a final touch in a project making this five-block area a kind of Estonian Wall Street. But road construction unceremoniously stopped when bulldozers recently unearthed remains of a sprawling, 600-year-old hospital in the very heart of the district, which has now been fenced off and restricted to pick-wielding archeologists.
While historians say the find will improve the understanding of the Middle Ages, many developers rolled their eyes in exasperation. They downplay the site’s importance and say the subsequent construction delays hurt business. Others complain the excavation is an eyesore, just the kind of thing Tallinn doesn’t need as it welcomes visitors to the city.
But like it or not, this unfinished street—with glassy towers looming over mud-caked stone walls—looks like it’s here to stay for some time: a stark symbol of a growing clash between preservationists and development forces.
There are similar tensions in Riga and Vilnius.
Debate in Latvia’s capital has revolved around what to do with the Art Nouveau buildings that comprise 40 percent of Riga’s city center. While some argue they should be meticulously restored, others say that’s simply not feasible.
In Lithuania, there’s debate about whether to reconstruct the Vilnius Castle, home to the nation’s medieval-era kings and dukes. With no original plans, some say the multi-million-dollar reconstruction from scratch would be a farce.
Tallinn’s skyline, once dominated by old town spires and red-topped medieval roofs, is increasingly characterized by high-rise buildings. Several more are expected to go up within the next few years, graphically illustrating the pace of architectural change.
Such commercially driven development is fairly new to the region.
Fifty years of Soviet rule wrought its own form of destruction, of course, not least of all the gratuitous Red Army bombing of the city centers in the three Baltic capitals. (Relative to elsewhere during World War II, however, the damage was limited.)
Crude Soviet planners also abandoned any pretense of creating aesthetically pleasing structures in favor of prefab, concrete blocks for buildings. Such monstrosities were sometimes even plopped alongside pre-war architectural gems.
But, with a stagnant economy and no private sector, there weren’t the commercial pressures to build that there are in the new-age, booming Baltics.
Much of the post-Soviet growth, to the chagrin at least of many preservationists, has focused on the historically unique Baltic capitals.
The United Nations has named the Tallinn, Riga and Vilnius old cities as World Heritage Sites, an honor bestowed on just 700 sites worldwide in 30 years. They’re on the list with the likes of the Egyptian pyramids, the Acropolis and Taj Mahal.
On one hand, the money generated by post-Soviet growth has paid for much of the impressive renovation that has already been done in the old cities, where scaffolding wrapped around medieval-era stone buildings is a common sight.
Still, even heritage officials at the UN have occasionally expressed concern about whether enough is being done to protect the old cities. They say the rush to create more office and residential space in highly coveted old-city locations has sometimes led to shoddy, historically inaccurate renovations.
Many businesses, wary about renovating old properties, favored constructing new buildings, if not in, then at least near the old cities.
A core problem is a lack of coherency in building regulations and planning, both the preservationists and developers agree.
Andri Ksenofontov, a heritage inspector in Estonia’s Culture Ministry in the 1990s, said there is no broad zoning policy in Tallinn, leading some officials to make it up as they go. “Soviet laws and city plans were nullified, but nothing was put in their place,” he said. “The result’s been a sort of chaos, a free-for-all.”
Ksenofontov says he sympathizes, in part, with builders—left to interpret rules that are subject to change at a whim. And he says he appreciates the need for balance between preservation and development. “But things have tipped too far in favor of development,” he argued.
“Given a choice, some prefer to pull down something old and build something new,” he said. “They say following old plans is slow and costly. But I don’t think the attitude can be: ‘If we don’t have money, let’s sell grandma.’”
Another enemy of preservationists? Traffic.
Car sales have soared over the decade. When in Soviet days you could drive through city centers on a workday evening and not see a single car—bumper-to-bumper rush hour traffic is increasingly the norm.
Alleviating traffic, rather than preserving a city’s uniqueness, sometimes seems the priority, said Ksenofontov. One justification for the road through the Tallinn business district was to ease traffic congestion on surrounding roads.
But critics say new roads, as in the case of the business-district thoroughfare, only create new, ever-more intractable traffic problems—including by funneling more cars further into the city center.
Such things, counter developers, are among the inevitable prices of progress.
They complain about what they say is a push in some quarters to maintain the status quo beyond reason. That, they say threatens to make the Baltic capitals anachronisms, virtual theme parks.
They also argue that they shouldn’t be set the impossible task of not touching anything of historical value: Dig down on almost any Baltic city street and you’re liable to hit something of historical significance.
Developers also defend the aesthetics of what they’re doing.
They aren’t so much overwhelming historical Tallinn, Riga and Vilnius with new developments as they are sweeping away the pervasive grayness that distinguished Soviet-era architecture, they argue.
Many Estonians like the new skyscrapers, seeing them as proud symbols of the country’s Westernness.
But critics point to nearby Helsinki as an example of the dangers in going too far. Thanks to massive building in the ’60s and ’70s, it’s hard to spot much that’s old in the Finnish capital—save for an odd hill-top church poking up through the urban sprawl. (Ironically, it was relative Soviet-era poverty that prevented any such construction spurt in the Baltic city centers, inadvertently ensuring that they retained their old-world feels.)
What’s needed, suggested Ksenofontov, is more sensitivity on the part of developers. He said preservationists could also be more creative, including with suggestions about how historically important buildings could be used for office space. “Developers need to understand that not everything can be measured in money,” he said. “And preservationists need to understand that it’ll be easier to preserve buildings when they’re not just museum pieces but places where someone can actually make money by using them.”

WASHINTON-VILNIUS (BNS) The U.S. Department of Justice initiated proceedings this week to revoke the U.S. citizenship of Lithuanian national Vladas Zajanckauskas based on his participation during the World War II in the Nazi-led destruction of a Jewish ghetto in Warsaw, the department said in a press release.
The complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court in Worchester, Massachusetts, alleges that Zajanckauskas served with the Nazis from mid-1942 until March 1945. According to the complaint, the suspect served as a guard at the Nazi-operated Trawniki Training Camp in German-occupied Poland, where he rapidly rose through the ranks to become a guard trainer himself. The Trawniki camp, run jointly by the SS and the German police, trained Eastern European recruits to assist the Nazis in murdering Jews in Poland.
The complaint charges that Zajanckauskas participated as a non-commissioned officer in the notorious operation to clear and destroy the Warsaw Ghetto, the district in which the Nazis forcibly confined Jews from the city and the surrounding areas. When some of the Warsaw Jews resisted removal to Nazi camps, German forces burned down the buildings of the ghetto and asphyxiated Jews by dropping incendiary bombs into the sewer tunnels where they were hiding.
The document further alleges that in addition to his own direct participation in the action, the Lithuanian man trained other men who carried out the liquidation, which lasted from April 19 to mid-May 1943.
Prior to the operation, the Warsaw Ghetto held about 40,000 Jews, of which about 7,000 were sent to be gassed at the Treblinka extermination camp and thousands more died in the fighting. The rest were sent to various Nazi concentration camps and the forced labor sites.
Zajanckauskas, now 87, immigrated to the United States in February 1950. The complaint alleges that he concealed his Nazi service when he applied for a visa by telling U.S. officials that he had been a farmer in Lithuania until 1944, fleeting afterwards to Germany and later to Austria.
Since the U.S. Office of Special Investigations started operations in 1979, 68 Nazi persecutors were have been stripped of U.S. citizenship while 55 such persons have been removed from the United States. More than 170 U.S. residents are currently under investigation.

Friday—May 31, 2002
VILNIUS-RIGA-TALLINN (CITY PAPER) Officials and activists Friday called for greater public awareness about trafficking women for prostitution in nations around the Baltic Sea—saying the trade had boomed since the collapse of the Soviet Union. “We want this problem to be on the agenda,” Carita Peltonen, a leading Finnish women’s activist, said at a three-day conference devoted to the topic that ended Friday. “If there is political will, you can end this business.” The gathering in Estonia’s capital was attended by some 300 delegates from the Nordic and Baltic countries. It was organized by the Nordic Council of Ministers and the ministries of health from the three Baltics. The Nordic Council and Baltic leaders earlier this year launched a 200,000-dollar campaign aimed at education—including of women in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania about the pitfalls of prostitution.
The regional sex trade usually involves poorer women from the Baltics or nearby Russia going to the richer Nordics to serve as prostitutes—transit made possible when the Iron Curtain came down more than a decade ago. Swedish Minister for Gender Equality Affairs Margareta Winberg said that each year 500 prostitutes are brought into Sweden alone—mostly from the Baltics and Russia; before 1997, she said there was little trafficking. Thousands of sex tourists from Finland, Sweden, Norway and Denmark also travel to the Baltics and Russia to use prostitutes. Finns account for nearly 50 percent of those paying for sex in Estonia, according to the Estonian Health Ministry.
Between 1-4 million women and children have been lured or coerced into the sex trade internationally, said Gunilla Ekberg, coordinator for the regional education project, dubbed the Nordic-Baltic Campaign Against Trafficking Women; there are an estimated 10,000-20,000 women working as prostitutes in the Baltic states. “Trafficking of women has become a relatively low-risk, high-profit activity attracting individual traffickers and organized crime groups,” she said.
Worldwide, Ekberg said the business generates some 7 billion dollars annually. Peltonen said the trade in women can be more lucrative than the trade in narcotics. “A drug you use once and it’s gone,” she said. “You can use a woman til she dies.”
There’s not complete unanimity about how to combat prostitution. Laws around the Nordic region vary, for instance, with Sweden implementing strict prohibitions on buying sex and Denmark legalizing some forms of prostitution. “Legalizing prostitution is a way of giving up and bowing to pressure from the international sex industry,” Winberg, the Swedish minister, argued. “I’m convinced these nations won’t be able to effectively deal with trafficking.” Over the past decade, both Estonia and Latvia have discussed ways of formally legalizing some forms of prostitution—though there now seems to be significant local opposition to the idea.