The Weekly Crier
News highlights from Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.
Updated every Monday.

News Highlights from July 2-July 9, 2001

Lithuania's parliament voted by a comfortable margin on July 3 to approve leftist leader Algirdas Brazauskas as the nation's new prime minister. 
       The 141-seat Seimas legislature voted 84-45 to approve the 68-year-old former president and one-time Lithuanian Communist Party leader as prime minister; there were three abstentions and other deputies weren’t present. 
       His own left-wing Social Democratic party unanimously backed him as did his main coalition partners, the center-left New Union; he also drew several votes from two small parties.
       The new government leader has two weeks to put together a Cabinet and submit it for parliamentary approval. 
       Lithuania has been a leading reformer since it regained independence in 1991, and Brazauskas told assembled deputies before Tuesday's vote that he will maintain Lithuania's pro-West, pro-reform course.
       "The main task of the new cabinet will be to continue vital reforms," he said. "Joining NATO and the European Union will be major tasks of this government." 
       President Valdas Adamkus, who was thought to have preferred center-right parties, had reluctantly nominated Brazauskas, whose policy positions the president has criticized in the past. 
       Adamkus conceded that political realities meant Brazauskas was the only candidate capable of winning parliamentary approval, but he promised to keep a close eye on the left-wing government, and to criticize it if necessary.
       Brazauskas became the top candidate after rows over privatization and other reforms brought down the government of Rolandas Paksas last month; it was backed by a centrist coalition. 
       Brazauskas was president from 1993-98 as a member of the Democratic Labor Party, which later merged with the Social Democrats.
       (For further details about Brazauskas and the collapse of the outgoing government, see news reports from previous weeks below.)

A fire badly damaged much of Estonia's embassy in Washington in the early morning hours of July 2; it took some 80 firefighters to bring the blaze under control.
       Estonians expressed shock at the damage, estimated at around 2.5 million dollars, and including some works of precious Estonian art. 
       Electrical wires in a basement wall apparently short circuited and caused the fire, according to early findings of fire investigators. 
       The embassy in Washington, which has been seen as a symbol of Estonia's restored place in the world stage following Soviet rule, was insured. But officials in Tallinn said money would still have to be raised to renovate the 96-year-old building. 
       No one was inside the embassy, located at 2131 Massachusetts Ave., at the time of the blaze. One fire fighter was slightly injured, however.     
       Since the embassy is considered Estonian soil, fire investigators needed permission to enter the building, though they got that permission almost immediately.
       It was reported that the home of Estonian Ambassador to the United States Sven Jürgenson will serve as the temporary embassy. 

News Highlights June 25-July 2, 2001

President Valdas Adamkus on June 29 reluctantly nominated ex-communist party boss and one-time President Algirdas Brazauskas, of the leftist Social Democrats, to be Lithuania's new prime minister. 
     Brazauskas, 68, is backed by two of the largest parties in the 141-seat Seimas—his own Social Democrats and the center-left New Union—so he should have more than enough support to win confirmation. 
     The president has criticized leftist policies in the past as too populist and he was believed to strongly favor center-right parties. But with leftists laying claim to a clear legislative majority, he had little choice but to nominate Brazauskas.
     In a televised speech, Adamkus said he had to face the reality of the political situation, but he warned that he would closely follow the progress of the leftist government. 
     He said it would have to take tough decisions, which could cause unavoidable hardships for some. He said European Union and NATO membership required it. 
     "The Euro-Atlantic road can't be paved only with declarations," Adamkus said. "It will require basic reforms inside the country and an essential modernization of Lithuania." 
     Centrist parties asked Adamkus to nominate acting Prime Minister Eugenijus Gentvilas, of the Liberal Union, to form a permanent government. But he would have faced almost certain defeat in parliament by the leftist bloc. 
     Brazauskas now has 15 days to assemble a Cabinet and win legislative approval. 
     The burly, white-haired Brazauskas is popular among many Lithuanians, who see him as affable and down to earth. But many businessmen and local media deride him as a man of the past and question his credentials to head a government. 
     Brazauskas headed the Lithuanian Communist Party in the 1980s and, after renouncing his communist links, he was elected president two years after the Baltic state regained independence. 
     Lithuania has been seen as a strong reformer and Brazauskas will almost certainly maintain its pro-West, pro-reform course. All major parties, the Social Democrats included, say they back Lithuania's EU and NATO bids. 
     But a leftist government would likely put the brakes on the privatization of the country's last state-owned industries, such as Lithuanian Gas, and they would likely lobby for more social spending and subsidies for farmers. 
     While Social Democrats say they back the drive to join the EU, they've said Lithuania may be in too big of a rush to join; they've heeded concerns of farmers, who fear membership in the 15-nation trading bloc could hurt them.
     Some business leaders have also expressed concern that a more leftist government could taint Lithuania's image abroad, complicating its drive to enter the EU and NATO and making it more difficult to attract foreign investment.
     Brazauskas was president as a member of the Democratic Labor Party, made up of reform-minded ex-communists, until 1998.  Afterwards, he spent much of his time on hunting trips and many believed he'd stay in the political background. Some local media had referred to him as "Lithuania's Pensioner No. 1." 
     But before elections last year, he stormed back into politics and helped the Social Democrats win more legislative seats than any other party. He expressed anger when his party was locked out of power by a centrist alliance. 
     But that Liberal Union-New Union ruling coalition, which also included two small parties, fell apart over differences on economic policy, opening the door for the New Union and the Brazauskas-led Social Democrats to join forces. 
     Outgoing Prime Minister Rolandas Paksas, of the pro-business Liberal Union, fought to slash taxes and red tape, but he was frustrated by fundamental policy disputes with the New Union—leading to his resignation last week. 

Lithuania announced on June 28 that it will peg its national currency, the litas, to the euro next year, abandoning the its seven-year link to the U.S. dollar.
          The peg to the dollar, which has been strong against the euro, has made Lithuanian products pricier in the 15-nation European Union, undercutting the competitive edge of local exporters.
     Lithuania, like its Baltic neighbors, Estonia and Latvia, has been negotiating to join the EU. All three countries hope to secure membership within the next three to four years.
     The dollar-to-euro shift will take place on Feb. 2, 2002.
     Lithuania replaced the Soviet ruble with its own money in 1992, a year after regaining independence from Moscow. In 1994, it fixed the litas to the dollar at an exchange rate of four to one; the rate has not changed.
     That firm foreign currency peg helped bring much needed stability to the Lithuanian economy, which in the early 1990s had seen annual inflation rates of over 1000 percent. Today, annual Lithuanian inflation is below 5 percent.

Family, friends and fans of motorcyclist Joey Dunlop gathered in Estonia on June 29 to unveil a monument along a forest road where the five-time Formula One world champion died during a race one year ago.
     Some 100 people, including Dunlop's brothers, attended a ceremony at a bend in the road where the celebrated racer skidded off the rain-drenched track and into a tree on July 2, 2000; officials said the 48-year-old died instantly.
     The road cum racetrack skirts a river and the Baltic Sea but runs mostly through a densely forested park; a dent is still visible in the pine where the Northern Ireland native hit it head on at some 150 kilometers an hour.
     Dunlop's death provoked an outpouring of grief, especially in Northern Ireland, from which he hailed. His funeral was attended some 50,000 people and televised live across Ireland.
     Fans have been leaving flowers at the base of the tree throughout the year and Estonians decided to place a permanent marker there in tribute to Dunlop, who many regard as one of the greatest motorcyclists ever.
     It consists of a modest granite stone a meter from the crash site; a Celtic cross is carved into it and a plaque reads, "Joey Dunlop, 1952-2000." His brothers Robert and Jimmy pulled the cover off the stone, revealing it to the public.
     Attending VIPs and friends, some whipping tears from their eyes, described Dunlop as an unassuming man who never let his superstardom go to his head.
     "In this day of sporting heroes, with their bank accounts and egos, Joey was different," Simon Shaw, a British embassy official in Tallinn, told attendees.
     Racing officials said speculation about the cause of the accident focused on Dunlop's choice of tires for the wet conditions around the 6-kilometer circuit, located just outside Tallinn.
     Raido Ruutel, a race organizer, said that Dunlop apparently chose a tire designed for rainy weather for his front wheel, but kept a more standard tire for the rear one.
     "Parts of the track were very wet and parts were drier and he may have seen this tire combination as giving him an advantage," he said. "He was such a great master and only he could take that risk. But sadly what happened happened."
     Ruutel conceded that the hundreds of trees on the very edge of the track were seen by some racers as a safety hazard; he said several had even declined to race on it in the past as a result.
     The Kalev Grand Race, in which Dunlop died, went ahead on the next day. 
     "We've placed some sand embankments along the track, including where Joey died, and we've improved the asphalt surface" he said. "But there's not the option of cutting down thousands of trees." 
     Dunlop's brothers said at a press conference after the service that they'd met the day before with a motorcyclist behind their brother when he crashed.
     "Speaking to him really helped fill in some of the missing pieces for us," Robert Dunlop, himself a professional motorcyclist, told journalists. "This was just a tragic accident that nobody could have recovered from."
     Ironically, well-known motorcyclist Phillip McCallen told The Irish Times just months before the Tallinn accident that Dunlop's safety record had encouraged him in a sport known for fatalities.
He said Dunlop was the exception to the rule.
     "He proves it is possible," said McCallen, "to win races and stay alive."
A related story....An Estonian motorcyclist died in a practice run just before the start of the June 30 Kalev Grand Race—nearly a year to the day that Dunlop lost his life on the same track.
     Tonu Raak, 35, was in a two-seat motorcycle when he spilled out of a side seat and rolled into a tree; he was pronounced dead at a hospital a half hour later.
     In contrast to the year before, the conditions were dry when the mishap occurred. Both accidents occurred at roughly the same bend in the road.
     Tallinn racing officials said they considered canceling the race after Saturday's fatality, but decided to go ahead after a brief commemoration was held; a flag at the main racing podium was also lowered to half mast.
     Later, the main Superbike race—which Dunlop won last year just
before his accident in the 125cc competition—was won by Englishman Paul Hunt; his compatriots Roy Jeffrey and Dave Woolans came in second and third.
     Race spokesman Erki Berends said after Saturday's race that officials could consider how to make the track safer. But he said it was unlikely the Kalev Grand Race would be canceled permanently.
     "Of course, this track has its dangers, but it's not more dangerous than other road-race tracks around the world," he said. He said the track was a favorite of many top-class riders because of the challenging terrain; he said Joey Dunlop had said it was one of his favorite.
     Berends said Saturday's death was only the second, after Dunlop's, in the 40 year history of the race. But he said the higher speeds of the motorcycles did make it more hazardous.
     The winner of this year's Superbike race averaged nearly 160 kph, about 30 kph more than the winner's average speed on the same track ten years ago.

Foreign ministers from ten eastern European nations vying to join NATO praised U.S. President George Bush on July 2 for supporting the enlargement of the alliance during his European tour last month.
     At their one-day meeting in Tallinn, they said they were encouraged by his speech in Poland, where he said he backed entry "for all of Europe's democracies that seek it and are ready to share the responsibility that NATO brings."
     In a joint statement, the ministers described Bush's address as "visionary;" Estonian Foreign Minister Toomas Ilves later told a news conference that it was "a landmark speech," an indication that "we're well on our way to enlargement."
     Delivered at Warsaw University on June 15, the Bush speech was heralded by the White House as one of the center pieces of his five-nation European trip.
     Buoyed by the U.S. president's pro-expansion comments, the NATO aspirants said they're now focusing on winning invitations to join the alliance during NATO's crucial summit in Prague, slated for the autumn of next year.
     The same participants—Albania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia—called in Vilnius, Lithuania last year for NATO to invite them all at once in a so called Big Bang.
     "We have left the post-Vilnius period. We're now in the pre-Prague phase," said Foreign Minister Ilves, speaking at a joint news conference with his nine counterparts.
     The joint statement in Tallinn called for all qualified candidates to be invited to join during the Prague summit. The alliance has signaled that invitations could be issued, but hasn't said how many or to whom.
     Ilves said he was convinced the United States strongly backed the entry of all the NATO aspirants. He quoted an unnamed senior White House official as telling him that the month before.
     Ilves quoted the official as saying, "'We've done what we said we would do. If they screw up, it's their own damn fault.' That is the U.S. position, unofficially and from a high level. That should be a sign to all of us here that is up to us and that it is our job to deliver." 
     The ten-nation gatherings of ex-communist countries, several of which have been held before in other eastern European capitals, are seen as a demonstration of solidarity as the nations lobby to join NATO.
     Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary were accepted into the alliance in 1999, pushing the number of NATO members from 16 to 19. But any new wave of expansion, in part because of Russian objections, is considered more sensitive.
     Moscow says it opposes NATO taking in new members—particularly the Baltic states—saying enlargement would threaten Russian security.

News Highlights from June 18-June 25, 2001

The leftist Social Democratic party appears poised to enter a new Lithuanian government with reformed communist and former President Algirdas Brazauskas as prime minister.
       The door to the participation of Brazauskas and his Social Democratic party was flung open after the center-right Liberal Union and the center-left New Union—which formed the core of an administration until it collapsed during the week—said they were unable to agree on how to stitch their coalition back together.
       The current crisis was triggered when the New Union on June 18 said they disagreed with Prime Minister Rolandas Paksas of the Liberal Union on important economic policies, and demanded he resign. He did so three days later.
       Paksas, a former stunt pilot and one-time Vilnius mayor, had promised to help stimulate the economy by slashing taxes and red tape when he assumed power after general elections late last year.
       But the 45-year-old was frustrated by having to depend on partners who had basic disagreements with his hands-off, free-market philosophy. They also complained he was a poor communicator and too self-confident. Even long-time supporters, including many business leaders, were angered by his inability to fulfill his campaign promises.
       The New Union began courting the Social Democrats, which is the single largest bloc in parliament, almost immediately after talks with the Liberal Union broke down. By June 25 both parties had named Brazauskas, who was also Lithuanian president from 1993-98, as their choice to be the next prime minister.
       President Valdas Adamkus, recuperating from surgery to remove his appendix last week, must nominate a prime ministerial candidate before parliament can vote to approve any new government. The president's office declined any immediate comment on whether he would name Brazauskas. 
       The president, a former citizen and long-time resident of the United States, has criticized policies of leftist parties in the past, though he traditionally names candidates who have majority support in parliament—which Brazauskas would now appear to have.
       The president has to nominate a new prime minister by no later than July 5. If he chooses to name a candidate who cannot get the support of the legislature that could lead to new elections. 
       In the past, the New Union has also criticized the Social Democrats, who advocate big increases in social spending, saying they were too far to the left. But the groups have found common ground, including in their backing of subsidies to farmers; they've also both opposed sharp tax cuts.
       Lithuania is seen as a leading market reformer among ex-communist states and any new government, including one led by Brazauskas, would likely maintain its staunchly pro-West and generally pro-reform course.
       But a leftist government would likely put the brakes on the privatization of the country's last state-owned industries, such as Lithuanian Gas. And while the Social Democrats back the drive to join the EU, they have said Lithuania is in too big of a rush to join; they've heeded concerns of farmers, who fear membership in the 15-nation trading bloc could adversely affect them.
       The Social Democrats merged with the reformed-communist Democratic Labor Party in 2000. The Democratic Labor Party headed the government from 1992-96, and ended up implementing many of the country's first open-market reforms; Brazauskas was president, as a member of the Democratic Labor Party, from 1993-98.
       Some business leaders have expressed concerns about a leftist government, saying it would be less inclined to streamline what they regard as a still bloated, inefficient government. Others wonder if a leftist coalition wouldn't taint Lithuania's image abroad, complicating its EU and NATO bids—and also making it more difficult for the nation to attract foreign investment.
       The New Union, which has 29 seats in the 141-seat Seimas, holds the balance of power in the fragmented legislature. Any alliance between them and the Social Democrats would control 77 seats, more than enough to approve the prime minister of their choice and to form a government. 
       The outgoing coalition, which also included the small Center Union and Modern Christian Democratic Union, had a slim 71-seat majority. Combined, the right-leaning parties wouldn't be able to form a majority on their own. 
       President Adamkus, 74, was rushed to the hospital on June 20 with acute appendicitis. He was operated on later that day and was expected to make a full recovery.  Just before he was rolled to the operating room, he accepted the premier's resignation and appointed Economics Minister Eugenijus Gentvilas as head of a caretaker administration.

The Dalai Lama has concluded an eight-day tour of the Baltic states, where there is deep popular sympathy for him and his causes. But there was also unease among some officials here that the Dalai Lama’s visit might offend China.
       The exiled Tibetan spiritual leader, whose visit was unofficial, held a brief unscheduled meeting Estonian Prime Minister Mart Laar upon his arrival in the region on June 19. Estonia's President Lennart Meri declined to meet him.
       Both Latvian President Vaira Vike-Freiberga and Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus did meet with the Dalai Lama later in the week, however, as did a number of prominent legislators and city government leaders. 
       "If people lived by the principles proclaimed by the Dalai Lama, the world would be far better and more beautiful," the Lithuanian president said.
       China, which occupied Tibet in 1950, sees the Dalai Lama as a supporter of Tibetan independence and has angrily objected in the past when world leaders received him. 
       Many Balts have expressed strong support for Tibet, which some see as having shared a similar fate to the Baltics, which were occupied by the Soviet Union in 1940.
       As the Dalai Lama arrived at the respective Baltic airports, he was greeted by hundreds of well-wishers waving Tibetan flags and holding placards reading, "Free Tibet." 
       The Dalai Lama last visited the Baltic states in 1991. His latest trip was organized by local universities, pro-Tibet parliamentarians and religious groups. 
       In Lithuania, the Dalai Lama stopped over in the country's second largest city Kaunas, where some officials worried that his visit could spoil Kaunas's new sister-city relationship with Xiamen, China.
       Some Baltic leaders, particularly Estonian President Meri, have faced sharp local criticism for appearing hesitant about broaching the issue of human rights in Tibet, where China is accused of destroying the region's cultural heritage. 
       The Baltic states have good political relations with China and have recently pushed hard to forge closer economic ties as well. 
       The Dala Lama himself said at various public gatherings that he did not intend to make Baltic leaders uncomfortable by visiting the region, and did not hold it against anyone who chose not to met him.

News Highlight from June 11-June 18, 2001

A key party in Lithuania's fragile ruling coalition government demanded on June 18 that Prime Minister Rolandas Paksas resign, saying it had too many objections to his economic policies. The move is almost certain to bring down the year-old government. 
       While a defiant Paksas rejected the resignation call by the center-left New Union, which forms the core of the coalition with the premier's own center-right Liberal Union, the government now appears mortally wounded.
       Paksas, 45, lashed out at his partners, telling a news conference later the same day that they had violated a coalition agreement requiring that any party wanting to pull out of the government provide 30 days notice.
       He also said he believed the four parties in the coalition, which also includes the small Center Union and Modern Christian Democratic Union, had recently begun to iron out their differences.
       "I don't understand their attempt to talk in the language of ultimatums," he said. "They are taking the government and the whole country hostage." He added he would do what he could to prevent the government from falling apart.
       But Paksas appears to have precious little leverage. His government has had just 71 seats in the 141-seat Seimas and without the New Union, which has 29 seats, it would fall well below a majority needed to continue on in power. 
       The opposition Social Democrats, led by the country's Soviet-era Communist Party boss Algirdas Brazauskas, have been ardent critics of Paksas and were now expected to try and form an alliance with the New Union. 
       The leftist Social Democrats won 48 seats in last year's election and form the largest parliamentary bloc. A coalition between the New Union and Social Democrats would control 77 seats, more than enough to form a government. Many observers seemed to think the two leftist groupings would try and succeed in doing just that.
       Paksas, a former stunt pilot champion and one-time mayor of Vilnius, vowed to help stimulate the economy by lowering taxes and cutting bureaucratic red tape when he assumed power following general elections late last year.
       The handsome, easygoing Paksas was seen by many as the golden boy of Lithuanian politics, someone who had no political connections to the era of communist rule. 
       But having to depend on center-left politicians—who had fundamental disagreements with his hands-off, free-market philosophy—meant Paksas was frustrated in his attempts to promote a less interventionist government.
       His left-wing partners disagreed with him on lowering taxes and also resisted his efforts to quickly privatize the Baltic state's energy utilities.
       Lithuania's economy slipped into recession after 1998 financial turmoil in Russia, one its largest trading partners. But it has begun to see strong economic growth again.
       Any new government would almost certainly maintain Lithuania's staunchly pro-West and generally pro-reform course. All the main parties in Lithuania say they back the country's bid to join the European Union and the NATO alliance.

Two twelve-year-old friends sat on separate prison trains 60 years ago this week peering out barbed-wire windows and listening, confused and afraid, to the clickety-clack of wagon wheels against the rails.
       Their families, like thousands of others across the Baltic states, had been awakened by Soviet troops, marched at gunpoint to these cattle cars and packed in. There wasn't room to lie down; holes in the wooden floors served as latrines. 
       But in a surreal interlude to their forced exile, their trains drew side by side, and young Lennart and Ulo suddenly saw each other. They shouted excitedly across the gap for several minutes until their trains finally diverged for good.
       One of those childhood playmates, Lennart Meri, is now Estonian president and he met Ulo Johanson again this week in one of many emotional events across the region marking the 60th anniversary of that first large-scale Soviet deportation, on June 14, 1941.
       Flags draped with black ribbons flew across all three Baltic states. In Estonia, church bells tolled at noon, and in Latvia people lit candles by a railway where they or their relatives had been herded onto Siberian-bound trains.
       In the decade after the Red Army occupied Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania in 1940, more than 200,000 people seen by dictator Josef
Stalin as potential enemies of the new regime were shipped to Siberia, more than 2,000 kilometers away. 
       The first wave of arrests, including of Meri and Johanson, were on that day in June. Since the Baltics regained independence, it has become an official day to remember all the mass deportations. 
       "Estonians were also arrested and killed before June 14, though this was done mostly in silence," explained Estonian historian Toomas Hiio. "But that day was when all Estonians saw with their own eyes what the new regime meant."
       Nearly 10,000 Estonians, including 4,000 children and infants, were arrested on June 14 alone; that was roughly 1 percent of the population. Some 15,000 people were deported from Latvia the same day, and nearly 20,000 from Lithuania. Two-thirds of those deported died in the harsh conditions, including severe food shortages, or were executed.
       The most ambitious commemoration was a three-week tour by President Meri to meet fellow survivors. His office said he met one-on-one with some 7,000 former deportees during gatherings at parks and farms. 
       At a park in Tallinn on June 13, the last day of the tour, 2,000 people, some in wheel chairs or clutching canes, waited in a cold, blustery rain for three hours to shake hands and exchange words with the president. One of the last in line was Ulo Johanson.
       "What a wonderful feeling to meet him again," said Johanson, now 72, minutes after shaking Meri's hand. "We played as children and we shared the same tragic fate. When we shook hands just now, he said, 'You see, we survived after all.'" 
       The president, whose second and final term ends this year, said he wanted to thank each survivor in person for persevering. He said they had lived to see their country regain its independence against the odds.
       "This isn't our day of glory, but neither is it a day of infamy," Meri told one gathering in southern Estonia. "We have won and they have lost."
       Meri has backed the prosecution of a handful of ex-officials who helped carry out the Stalinist deportations, but insists Estonians
aren't out for revenge. He said they merely want to understand and shed light on the dark Stalinist-era. 
       "We don't have the luxury of living in the past like some old French aristocrats," he said in an interview. "It's our duty to live for the future. And this can only be achieved without hating the past and without seeking revenge...We must fully understand this aspect of our past, to be absolutely sure that it is not repeated in the lives of my children and grandchildren." 
       In a series of interviews, the Estonian president said he clearly remembered the day he was deported He awoke, he recalled, to the sound of soldiers' boots stomping down the hall outside his bedroom in the early morning hours; they had stormed into the house to arrest the whole family. 
       Meri, his five-year-old brother, mother and father were given 20 minutes to pack. The soldiers told the Meris they were, of all things, being taken to have a sauna. 
       "It was the most ridiculous explanation I'd ever heard in my life," said Meri.
       He explained that the time they did have to pack, however short, was critical.
       "It was minus 50 Celsius in Siberia," he explained. "Twenty minutes is enough to find your trousers and your snow boats. Finding them saved my life." 
       When they were delivered to awaiting trains, surrounding by troops and menacing guard dogs, it became clear that Meri's father would be put on one train and the rest of the family on another. 
       "'We have to say goodbye now. We may not see each other for a long time,'" Meri recalls his father saying. "He then took me aside and said that I was now that elder in the family, at just 12, and that I should take care of my mother and brother. As we walked away, I looked back twice at him before he disappeared." 
       In the 1990s, Meri got access to KGB archives in Tallinn that provided further details of his deportation. He found out that the number of the train that carried him to Siberia was 293, the convoy unit was No. 153 OKV and the commanding officer that day was a Lieutenant Donchenko.
       Detailed instructions on how to deal with the Estonians included the short but ominous "Clause G": "Singing prohibited." 
       Meri told an audience this past week that Estonia needed to focus on integrating with the West, including by joining the NATO military alliance, saying that would ensure their children and grandchildren never share their fate of 60 years ago.
       Baltic leaders often cite such Soviet repression as a main inspiration for their bids to join NATO. The alliance says the door is open to them, but Russian opposition his made the question of Baltic entry highly sensitive.
       "Estonia is expecting to join the NATO," the Estonian president said. "It'll mean our children and children's children won't have to be worried about their security. Let them be worried about their math homework instead." 
                   —By Michael Tarm, CITY PAPER/Baltics Worldwide editor

Vilnius Mayor Arturas Zuokas has installed a 24-hour Internet camera in his office, saying it was part of a campaign to make the city government more open to public scrutiny. 
       The so called webcam, which was officially switched on June 15, is pointed at a conference table where the mayor holds meetings with other city officials. The site has no audio and visitors can't hear those present in the room. 
       Residents in Lithuania frequently complain about lazy or allegedly corrupt public servants. Zuokas said the webcam should help reassure people that officials are hard at work and honest. 
       "The Vilnius municipality has nothing to hide," said Zuokas, vowing that the camera would stay on at least as long as he is mayor. 
       Internet use has risen steadily in Lithuania in recent years, with 15 percent of all households in Vilnius currently online; nationwide, that figure is around 10 percent of the Baltic state's 3.5 million residents, officials said.
       (You can view the mayor's webcam at http://vilnius.delfi.lt/ )

A scheme to distribute free bicycles to ease traffic congestion has, as some expected, run into a slight problem: some people keep stealing or vandalizing the vehicles. 
       Vilnius authorities initially launched the program on June 8, allowing anyone to grab and use the state-owned, bright-orange bicycles left unattended around the old city.
       The bicycles had been painted orange and tagged to discourage anyone from trying to steal them, and police were supposed to politely direct anyone who ventured out of the old city to go back.
       But within just a few days, some 300 of the 500 bikes were stolen and 100 were badly damaged, according to local media reports. No thieves have reportedly been caught.
       Officials wouldn't directly confirm the reports, and some suggested that they didn't believe that may bicycles had been stolen—only misplaced. 
       The AFP news agency said that the bicycles could be bought on the black market for as little as five dollars, and three times as much if the color and tags had been successfully altered.  
       The bicycles, valued at around 70,000 dollars, were donated by
private sponsors and are insured. Another 500 bicycles are slated to be added to the existing fleet within several weeks.
       Amsterdam once tried something similar, but many of the bicycles in that experiment were stolen or became quickly ruined. The Dutch quickly abandoned the program.

News Highlights from June 4-June 11, 2001

Vilnius authorities launched a program on June 8 allowing anyone to grab and use bright-orange bicycles left unattended around the old city, while skeptics said many of the vehicles will be quickly stolen.
       Officials said the scheme to provide the unlocked bicycles free of charge will reduce traffic and improve pedestrian mobility in the medieval-era quarter, which, with its narrow streets, has become badly congested in recent years.
       The bicycles were painted orange and also tagged to discourage anyone from trying to steal them. They are supposed to be ridden in the old city and police will direct anyone who ventures out of the area to ride back into the old city.
       Speculation has been rife about how many bicycles might be stolen before the service ends in October. Some newspapers said they expect half to be gone within a day. Others called the project a test of how trustworthy Lithuanians are.
       The bicycles, valued at around 70,000 dollars, were donated by private sponsors and are insured. Another 500 bicycles are slated to be added to the existing fleet within several weeks.
       Amsterdam once tried something similar, but many of the bicycles in that experiment were stolen or became quickly ruined. The Dutch quickly abandoned the program.

Police in Estonia have charged 12 Stalinist-era officials with crimes against humanity for helping to deport scores of people to Siberia over five decades ago. 
       The suspects, in their 70s and 80s, are accused of assisting in the arrest and exile of some 1000 men, women and children on Saaremaa island on March 25, 1949. The names of the accused weren't released. 
       Authorities have been investigating the suspects for more than six years, interviewing surviving deportees and combing old Soviet secret police archives in the Estonian capital for evidence. 
       This is the largest group of humanity crimes suspects ever charged at one time by police here, and it came a week before Estonians mark the 60th anniversary of the first mass deportation under Soviet rule on June 14, 1941. 
       Soviet forces invaded Estonia and the other Baltic states, Latvia and Lithuania, in 1940; after a brief German occupation, the Soviets retook them in 1944. 
       Dictator Josef Stalin ordered that thousands of perceived Soviet enemies be deported to Siberia, where many died in the harsh conditions. In Estonia alone, some 60,000 people were shipped to Siberia in cattle trains in the 1940s. 
       Since 1991, Estonia has indicted six former agents, five of whom were later convicted. One, 76-year-old Karl-Leohard Paulov, is currently in Tallinn Central Prison and now into his sixth month of an eight-year jail sentence. 
       Moscow has sharply criticized the Baltic prosecutions, calling them revenge. But officials here insist they're seeking long overdue justice and shedding light on some of the worst human rights abuses of the 20th century.
       (Also see the feature story, Stalin's Agents, on this site.) 

News Highlights from May 28-June 4, 2001

NATO Secretary General George Robertson said on May 31 that NATO was as committed as ever to accepting new members, though Lithuanian Prime Minister Rolandas Paksas later issued an emotional appeal for greater clarity about just when candidates might be expected to join.
       "NATO's door remains open because the alliance believes that one fundamental principle must be respected: that in today's Europe, every democratic country must have the right to choose its own security arrangements freely," Robertson said. 
       He was speaking at the end of a conference of NATO's parliamentary assembly being held in Lithuania. The body includes legislators from the 19 NATO countries; 10 candidate nations and five associate members also took part. Discussions focused on membership for the Baltic states, whose bids are considered by many to be controversial because Russia so strongly opposes their entry. 
       Addressing the floor just after the secretary general, Lithuanian Prime Minister Paksas asked for more specifics from NATO, referring to "the stress of anticipation and uncertainty Lithuania feels on the threshold of the alliance's open door."
       "Today, we are asking you, our alliance partners: when?" said Paksas, delivering the last address of the five-day assembly meeting. 
Robertson didn't mention the Baltic states by name in his keynote speech, but insisted that all European countries showing they're able to contribute to making the alliance stronger would be given a fair hearing by NATO.
       "Let me be very clear, and very blunt: this includes every democratic country in Europe," he told some 600 participants. 
       The Baltics, as the other NATO candidate nations--Slovakia, Bulgaria, Romania, Slovenia, Croatia, Albania and Macedonia--are hoping to win formal invitations to join the alliance during a key NATO summit in Prague next year.
       But some Baltic officials have expressed concerns that they could be denied invitations in deference to Russian feelings even if their militaries are near to meeting NATO's membership requirements. 
       "One often gets the impression that as we and the West are involved in talks about our NATO membership, the shadow of Russia looms over our heads. Is it not, however, a pretext for unwillingness to make a decision?" Paksas said. 

Legislators from the United States and Lithuania changed from suits and ties to T-shirts during the NATO meeting in Lithuania to fight it out on the basketball court.
       The impromptu match pitted U.S. congressmen, including Senator Gordon Smith of Oregon, against the Lithuanians, with Speaker Arturas Paulauskas leading their side. Both teams were supplemented by
journalists from their home nations.
       The Americans sealed their hard-fought victory only in the final minutes of the game, with Congressman John Shimkus of Illinois sinking his third three-pointer; the final score in the May 29 match was 65-57. 
       Lithuanian Ambassador to the United States Vygaudas Usackas, who also played in the game, joked later that granting Lithuania membership in NATO would be apt compensation for the humility of being defeated on their home turf.

Estonia came within minutes of a monumental upset of one of the powerhouses in world soccer on June 2, taking the lead twice late in a match against Holland in Tallinn. But in the end it was the Dutch who eked out a 4-2 victory in the dying minutes of their Group 2 qualifying match. 
       Ireland was slated to play Estonia on June 6, but the luck of the Irish got here four days early _ and it seemed for most of the match to be all with the underdog Estonians against the hapless Dutch.
       The scrappy and progressively self-confident Estonians spent most of the game dodging one bullet after another. Holland had a dozen good tries, but a stubborn home team defense, led by goalie Martin Kaalma, prevented them from converting. 
       Estonia created few chances for most of the game and seemed to settle in for a defensive match, when Andres Oper suddenly broke behind the Dutch lines, danced passed a sole defender and converted the first score of the game, inspiring delirious cheers from nearly 10,000 home fans. 
       The first time the Dutch got on the scoreboard was from an own goal in the 70th minute by Raio Piiroja. But with the game tied, it was the Estonians who then began to show most of the initiative and skill, when Indrek Zelinksi took a pass from the left side and headed the ball cleanly into the net. 
       With time running out and their side leading 2-1, ecstatic home fans smelled victory in what might have been the country's greatest ever soccer triumphs.
       The Dutch side, however, pulled the rabbit out of the hat by scoring successively, starting with Ruud van Nistelrooy and ending with Patrick Kluivert, in the final seven minutes of the game to finally put away the high-tension game. 
       In the lead up to Saturday's match, the Dutch side had been dogged by scandal surrounding players Frank de Boer and Edgar Davids. Davids has been barred from playing and de Boer, who did play Saturday, is awaiting a ruling. 

Estonia officially declared on May 29 that it would stage next year's Eurovision, the much maligned but widely watched song contest that draws over 100 million television viewers from around the world. Estonia was given the task of hosting the hugely popular contest after winning the 2001 competition last month.
       Some questions had been raised at home and abroad about whether Estonia had the money and the facilities to stage the event. But Estonian officials have long insisted they had no doubts that it would be well within their financial and organizational means. 
       Many Estonians see the Song Contest as an unparalleled opportunity to boost Estonia's name-recognition abroad, possibly leading to an even greater influx of tourists and even additional foreign investment. Some Estonians suggest it could even enhance the nation's drive to join the European Union. 
       Estonian public television (ETV), which will have to take the lead in organizing the event, has been in dire financial straits for years, and long-standing disputes over government funding came to the fore during recent talks over Eurovision 2002. 
       ETV director Aare Urm was heavily criticized for appearing to hold the contest hostage, hinting that Estonia may turn down the privilege of hosting it if substantial state funds weren't allotted to the country's public station. Finance Minister Siim Kallas called the apparent threat "attempted blackmail." 
       In the end, the government said it would provide nearly 3 million dollars specifically for the staging of the contest. ETV had been asking for almost twice that amount. 
       Until recently, Estonia had few venues large or modern enough to hold such a large event. But the nearly completed Saku Suurhall in Tallinn seats 10,000 and is thought to be well suited. Another possible venue is the new 15,000-seat national soccer stadium, which is also just now being fully completed. 
       Estonian President Lennart Meri had earlier called for donations from members of the public to help underwrite Song Contest expenses, which are expected to run over 10 million dollars. He said donations could be made through the Cultural Foundation's Hansapank account, No. 221013869800.
       (Also, see Eurovision 2002 on this site, for more details about the 2001 Estonian winners, here.)

Tallinn's embattled mayor, Juri Mois, submitted his resignation on May 31 following months of criticism from the opposition and then members of his own Pro Patria party for a series of political blunders. 
       Mois, a former bank executive who took over as mayor in late 1999, has been credited with streamlining the city government and for imposing new corporate efficiency on many key departments. 
       But his awkwardness in dealing with the political side of his job, plus questions about whether he was mixing his business and personal interests with his official duties, continually drew fire.
       A first try at electing a new mayor on June 1 ended in deadlock with center-left opposition leader Edgar Savisaar and center-right candidate Tonis Palts receiving the same number of votes in the 64-seat city government chamber. 
       (See a CITY PAPER interview with the outgoing mayor from last year, here.) 

News Highlights from May 21-May 28, 2001

Analysis: Euroskepticism Up—The days seem to be over when support among people in the Baltic states for European Union membership was automatic—almost knee-jerk. Public opinion polls in all three countries indicate backing for EU entry is on a downward slide, below 50 percent and falling. EU skepticism is hardly rampant and doesn't appear to be deep-seeded, but it is increasingly detectable. Hard proof of that came in Latvia, where the euroskeptic Social Democrats made substantial gains in local elections held across the country. The left-wing group complained that the government was disregarding growing poverty and high unemployment as it made its headlong rush into the arms of the EU. One of the party's campaign slogans was: Latvia first, the EU later. Until the Social Democrats came along, virtually every mainstream party in the Baltic states was unabashedly pro-EU. 
       Most people expressing reservations about the EU don't seem to be able to put their unease into words. Some ask why they should scramble to join a giant, at least partly centralized Union after they just spent 50 years trying to break free of another giant, centralized Union, the Soviet one. Others wonder about a loss of sovereignty, while some businessmen say they're nervous about being saddled with mountains of new EU-inspired rules, regulations and taxes. But much of the skepticism appears born of a gut-level sense that Lithuanian, Latvian and Estonian governments are too quick to embrace all aspects of the EU without first fully understanding all the implications. One of the few openly euroskeptic Baltic politicians, Estonian Igor Grazin, likened it to stampeding to buy a ticket on a train when you have no idea where that train is going. 
       Whatever the reason for the budding EU phobia, nervousness among Baltic political leaders—who have always tended to be far more enthusiastic about EU membership than the average Baltic Joe—is palpable. After appearing to brush public opinion for years as an irrelevance, Baltic leaders have now begun lobbying their own people in earnest, and in some cases in a near panic. Their pro-EU argument usually boils down to a dire warning: if we stay out of the EU, our economy and national security situation will become bleak in the extreme. Other officials say more bluntly, and usually only in private, that if the EU is a train, however imperfect, it is the only train in town and the Baltics have no choice but to hop on. 
       Top EU officials have joined the lobbying effort with surprising forthrightness. During a recent visit to Estonia, EU commissioner for expansion Guenter Verheugen minced few words as he spelled out what he believed would be the consequences if Estonia didn't join the powerful trading bloc. For starters, he said Estonia, because its domestic market is so small, would lose its appeal to foreign investors; he said Estonia is attractive precisely because it had trade ties to the giant EU market and because businessmen expect those to be developed further. "Without membership, Estonia would not be a less attractive place for investment—it would be a non-place," Verheugen said bluntly. He said membership would also make Estonia more secure. "The EU is certainly not a military alliance, but it is a security producer," he said. "Being a member of the EU, the security situation will improve. Members of the EU are basically immune from pressure from abroad." 

The NATO Parliamentary Assembly, a highly influential body including legislators from 19 NATO countries and 10 candidate nations, began meeting in Lithuania on May 27 in one of the largest conferences of its kind ever held in the Baltic state. 
       Some 1000 delegates are attending the five-day conference, which is also meeting for the first time on territory that was once under the control of the Red Army, NATO's erstwhile enemy. 
       The assembly has no decision-making power within NATO, but national legislatures of all member states must ratify enlargement decisions, so the gatherings can play key roles in thrashing out such delicate issues. 
       Membership for the Baltics, because Russia opposes it so vehemently, is considered the most contentious enlargement question. Baltic officials are taking the opportunity of the Vilnius conference to lobby legislators, which includes leading congressmen from the United States. 
       Several hundred pro-NATO supporters gathered in downtown Vilnius, some waving NATO and Lithuanian flags, to show their backing for alliance membership. There was also a slightly smaller contingent of protesters nearby voicing opposition to NATO entry; they said it would lead to the needless and economically harmful militarization of the country. 
       Most polls show clear majority support for NATO membership in all three Baltic states. 
       Russia made known its own displeasure about the prospect of Baltic membership by refusing to send a delegation to the meeting. Russian legislators usually do attend as part of post-Cold War cooperation.
       NATO, which admitted the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland in 1999, has said for years that the door to the Baltic states is open, but that they weren't yet ready militarily.
       But the three countries have made substantial progress in building up and modernizing their militaries, progress which has brought the potentially divisive political issue of whether NATO will risk offending Russia by admitting them to the fore. 
       That they didn't seem close to qualifying several years ago made Baltic membership a highly theoretical, so less volatile question. But now that Baltic claims to being closer to qualifying are more credible, the issue of their membership has become all the more of a hot potato.
       NATO members including Germany seem reluctant to upset Russia by letting the Baltic states join, while other members, such as the Czech republic, have called for them to be admitted as soon as possible.
       Estonian Foreign Minister Toomas Ilves says the Baltics shouldn't be penalized for having been brutally annexed by the USSR—a country he likened to a vampire that, while dead, still exerted unjustifiable influence.
       "We couldn't imagine Britain claiming hegemony over the security choices of the U.S. because it once was part of the British empire. What's the statute of limitations? When do we declare the Soviet Union over and done with," he said.
       Many NATO candidate nations hope U.S. President George W. Bush will make enlargement a focus of his visit to Europe next month. Bush has signaled he could back Baltic entry, but he hasn't made any firm commitment. 
       Crucially, Bush appears less concerned about offending Russia than his predecessor, which could bode well for Baltic NATO prospects, according to Nicholas Redman, an analyst at Oxford Analytica, a leading defense and political affairs consultancy in England. 
       "While some members stick to the don't-upset-Russia line, we are moving towards a position where, for the first time, Baltic membership can be considered on its own merits," he said. "The fears of upsetting Russia are receding." 
       Redman agreed Baltic militaries have made impressive progress across the board. 
       While he said such efforts have boosted their chances of entering NATO one day, he hastened to add that they, as other NATO candidate nations, have found the qualification process more difficult than they imagined. 
       "It's not only about getting the right rifles, howitzers and missiles, but also about changing the armed forces structure, the missions, the mentality, the training regimes and personnel policies," he said. "The good news for Balts is that the final NATO decision is political rather than technical, so a few technical shortcomings won't necessarily matter. But it obviously helps to get as close to the required level as possible." 
 
A businessman serving as Lithuania's main diplomatic representative in Lebanon was dramatically kidnapped, but then quickly released. 
       Raymond Sarkis, who is Lebanese but who has been the acting honorary consul for Lithuania, was kidnapped near Beirut over the weekend. His car was found abandoned in mountains outside the Lebanese capital. 
       But a day later, on May 28, he reappeared, saying he had convinced his captors to let him go. He said they took 6,000 dollars he had been carrying at the time. They had earlier called his family and demanded a ransom. 
       Kidnapping was common during Lebanon's civil, which ended in 1990, but has been rare since then.

News Highlights from May 14-May 21, 2001

Lithuania's on-again, off-again gambling legalization plans are on again. Parliament on May 17 ignored presidential appeals and gave final approval to gambling legislation that is now almost certain to become law. 
       President Valdas Adamkus refused to sign the bill when it was first sent to him last month, saying it needed substantial changes to ensure that organized crime didn't become entrenched in any new gambling industry. 
       But the 141-seat Seimas parliament voted 78 to 18 to approve the legislation without any changes. By law, the president is now obliged to sign the bill within three days. 
       It will legalize casinos, betting on sports, lotteries and other forms of gambling for the first time. It is slated to take effect on July 1.
       The bill, drafted by ruling centrists, was opposed by many right-wing groups, which said it would fuel crime. Opposition Conservatives added that gambling violated moral norms of this predominantly Catholic nation.
       The government estimated that 6.25 million dollars could be raised annually through taxes on gambling establishments, revenue it said could be funneled to schools and other cash-strapped public sectors.

Supermodel Carmen Kass was recently ticketed for drunk driving in her Estonian homeland and her name was released publicly as part of an anti-drunk driving campaign, police said on May 14. 
        The 22-year-old, who won the model of the year title at the prestigious VH1/Vogue Fashion Awards in 2000, was stopped in her BMW in the early morning hours of April 28, according to police spokesman Indrek Raudjalg. 
        Her name was only made public Monday as part of a policy of regularly releasing the names of those fined for drunk driving. Raudjalg said it's believed the public embarrassment may dissuade others from drinking and driving. 
        Kass, reportedly discovered by a modeling scout in a supermarket when she was 14, is one of Estonia's few internationally known celebrities. She works much of the year in New York City, but also partly owns a Tallinn-based modeling agency. 
        The detector used in Kass's case only indicated her blood-alcohol level was above the 0.2 legal limit. But officers who stopped her said they didn't believe she'd been drinking heavily and was probably just over the limit, Raudjalg said. 
        It was Kass's first drunk-driving offense and she was fined 3021 Estonian kroons (180 dollars). She was in the United States at the time of the May 11 hearing to assess her fine and was represented by her mother, as allowed by law. 
        The maximum fine for first-time drunk driving offenders is 8000 kroons (470 dollars), a high sum for most people in Estonia. 
        Raudjalg said 205 people were killed and 1814 injured in traffic accidents last year, which gives Estonia (pop. 1.4 million) a per capita traffic accident rate that is several times other European nations.
       (For related articles see Deathly Driving and Model City on this site.) 

Latvia says it is determined to end hazing in the military, pointing to charges filed during the week against 15 army conscripts as an illustration that the practice will not be tolerated in this NATO-candidate nation.
        The young conscripts were accused of repeatedly punching new arrivals in the chest as part of a hazing ritual. One of the conscripts, who was 20, died of a heart attack shortly after being hit. If convicted, the suspects could receive several years in jail.
        Latvia has been vying for NATO membership since the early 1990s, and officials said that hazing was a carryover for the Soviet era and that it has to be eradicated as part of the process of modernizing the army. 

A container with medium-level radioactive waste fell off a truck and broke open onto a road on May 15, though officials said the small spill was quickly cleaned and never posed a threat to public safety.
        The incident occurred inside the grounds of the sprawling Soviet-built Ignalina atomic power plant, 130 kilometers northeast of Vilnius.
        Plant officials rated the severity of the accident a 1 on a 0-7 scale. Didziulyte said the world's worst nuclear accident at Chernobyl, Ukraine in 1986 rated a 7 according to internationally set standards. 
        Lithuanian environmentalists also downplayed the seriousness of Tuesday's accident, but said it demonstrated that mishaps can happen and that the plant should eventually be closed. 
        Lithuania has pledged to shut down one of the two, 20-year-old reactors at Ignalina, but the 15-member European Union has urged it to commit to closing the second reactor as well. 
        EU officials have said Lithuania's failure to close the entire atomic facility, which is the same type as the one at Chernobyl, could jeopardize Lithuania's bid to join the powerful trading bloc.
        But some Lithuanians say costs of closing the country's sole nuclear plant, which provides over 70 percent of Lithuania's energy needs, would be far too high and cause steep hikes in the cost of electricity. 
       (For a report of several years ago from the Ignalina plant, see In the Belly of the Beast.)

Latvian police have arrested a former Soviet officer suspected of taking part in the Soviet army's Riga crackdown in January, 1991, which left four people dead. 
        Mihail Sidoriv, 32, hasn't yet been formally charged and officials didn't provide details about exactly what role he supposedly played in the 1991 attack, which centered on a government building in the Latvian capital. 
        Ten other soldiers were convicted in Latvia in 1999 for their roles in the crackdown, part of a general effort by the Kremlin at the time to halt Baltic drives towards independence. 
       (See the article 'Keep Filming' in the latest CITY PAPER, NO. 52 May/June 2001, for an account of the Riga crackdown.) 

News Highlights from May 7 to May 14, 2001

Special Report—When Estonian Prime Minister Mart Laar realized his country's entrant was about to win the most widely watched television song contest on Earth, he said that he jumped out of his chair in front of his TV and screamed for joy. 
       Nearby, thousands of Estonians also streamed out of bars and onto the capital's streets to wave the national blue, black and white flag as singers representing the country dramatically trumped contest favorites, France and Sweden. 
       The victory in the hugely popular Eurovision Song Contest on May 13 was doubly sweet for this small nation that is sometimes self-conscious about whether the outside world knows where or what Estonia is, or even that it exists at all. Estonian newspapers reflected the national euphoria: "Unbelievable!" said a giant headline in the Ohtuleht daily, which devoted half of its 32 pages to the Eurovision triumph.
       An ecstatic Prime Minister Laar said that the Estonian victory, watched by as many as 200 million viewers around the world, should, to say the lest,  make name recognition a lesser problem. He said it was a thrill to have heard the word Estonia, Estonia, Estonia all night on the Eurovision program, which annually pulls in some of the largest worldwide TV audience figures—rivaled only by coverage of major sporting events, like the Olympics.   
       "This feels very, very, very good," said Laar, who has led a government campaign recently to convey a stronger, more positive image of Estonia abroad. "This could be a big benefit to our country." 
       Estonia is seen as having one of the most successful and progressive economies among Europe's ex-communist states, but officials complain they sometimes have to fight misconceptions that they're backward somehow.
       The prime minister said he hoped the publicity the contest has already brought to Estonia and will bring when it hosts the contest next year, could dramatically boost tourism and indirectly prompt even greater interest by foreign investors. 
       Estonia's duo of Tanel Padar and Dave Benton took first place with the soulful song entitled Everybody. The pair drew 198 points, comfortably beating out the other 22 participating countries, including second place Denmark. Estonia became the first eastern European country to win the contest since the collapse of communism.
       Despite Estonian fears that their Baltic neighbors might have taken offense to recent comments by  Estonian Foreign Minister Toomas Ilves blasting the notion of Baltic unity (and that they may therefore snub the Estonians at Eurovision), both Latvia and Lithuania ended up giving the Estonian entry the maximum 12 points.
       Estonia only began taking part in the much maligned but widely watched Eurovision Song Contest after it regained independence following the 1991 Soviet collapse. 
       Laar said its popularity here is partly due to Estonia having been cut off behind the Iron Curtain for so many decades. Soviet authorities banned broadcasts of the contest, which they saw as representing capitalist decadence, he said. 
       But some Estonians were able to watch the contest by turning their TV antennas to the northwest and picking up broadcasts from the Finnish capital, 90 kilometers across the Baltic Sea.
       "When you watched it in Soviet days, it was almost a kind of feeling of protest," said Laar, now 41, who said he first remembers seeing the Swedish group ABBA triumph with their song Waterloo in 1974; ABBA was one of the few winners who rode Eurovision success on to international stardom later. 
       Laar shrugged off the contest's reputation as a celebration of mediocrity, and said he didn't mind that Eurovision is often the butt of jokes. 
       "I joke about Eurovision, too," he laughed. "But so what? This contest brings Europe together once a year, and it's a tremendous accomplishment for our country." 
       Some observers questioned whether Estonia will be able to raise the funds needed to stage the contest next year, as the winning country is obliged to do. Estonian state TV, which would have to take the lead in organizing the 2002 Song Contest, has recently faced serious financial problems and has been operating at a loss. 
       But officials in the fiscally conservative government insisted they would find a way to scare up the necessary funding, saying the return on the payment would be a thousand fold in the increased interest in Estonia. The contest is expected to cost over 5 million dollars to put on; part of the expenses would be covered by an association of European broadcasters. 
       Ironically, Estonia scored its PR coup at least partly with the help of a non-Estonian; Dave Benton is a native of the Caribbean island of Aruba, and has worked in the past as a back-up singer for the likes of Tom Jones, Jose Feliciano, Billy Ocean and The Platters. Benton is married to an Estonian and has been living in Estonia for several years. 
       After winning the contest before some 40,000 people at an outdoor stadium in Copenhagen, Benton said the victory was a peak in his career. 
       "I have been working with big names, but this is the biggest achievement," he said. "I think for the first time in my life, I will get really drunk tonight." 
       (You can hear Estonia's winning song at www.songcontest.com.  Also on this site, see the article about Latvia's critically acclaimed Eurovision entry in 2000, the band BrainStorm, here.)

Portland Trail Blazer Arvydas Sabonis sharply criticized his team for having too many overpaid but underperforming stars, a daily newspaper in his Lithuanian homeland reported on May 11. 
        The 7-foot-3 center complained that the team lost 17 of its final 25 games despite an NBA-record 90-million-dollar payroll. The Los Angeles Lakers also swept Portland 3-0 in the first round of the Western Conference playoffs. 
       "There aren't players on the Portland team, just names earning millions," the 36-year-old was quoted by Lietuvos Rytas as saying while visiting Kaunas. 
       "Portland coach Mike Dunleavy failed to bring the team's stars down to planet earth and should have been fired midseason," Sabonis said. Dunleavy was fired by the Trail Blazers this week.
       Sabonis, whose three-year, 30-million-dollar contract ends this year, refused to speculate about his future with Portland.
       "I've gotten used to being in Portland and would like to stay there, but I don't know how things will turn out," he was quoted as saying. 
       He hinted he might like to end his career playing for Lithuania's Zalgiris Kaunas, a top team in Europe and one that Sabonis partly owns. 
       "Someday I might play with them, if they'll take me," he was quoted as saying. 

Estonian President Lennart Meri will launch a three-week nationwide tour to meet fellow Estonians who, like Meri himself, were forcibly exiled by Stalinist forces 60 years ago, his office said May 11. 
       Meri, deported aboard a cattle train when he was just 12 in 1941, the year after the Soviet Union occupied independent Estonia, said he wanted to meet face to face with survivors as a key anniversary of the deportations approaches.
       "I want to shake their hands, look them straight in the eye, and say, 'We survived," the 72-year-old Meri, who has written extensively about the harsh conditions of exile in Siberia, told Estonian Radio. 
       During his meetings at parks and farms in each of Estonia's 15 counties, President Meri hopes to be able meet every attending survivor one-on-one, at least briefly, said presidential adviser Toomas Hiio. His tour begins May 28.
       The president, whose second and final term as president ends later this year, wanted to take this opportunity to meet deportees before he leaves office and before many survivors became too elderly, Hiio said. 
       Commemorations of the deportations, which took place in mid-June of 1941, are planned across Estonia and also in neighboring Latvia and Lithuania, where thousands of people were also exiled. 
       Events include a concert in Tallinn by rock star Sting on June 14, the day most deportations occurred. Meri and his family, with 10,000 others, were also deported on that day; another 50,000 were exiled in later years. 
       "Estonians were also arrested and killed before June 14, though this was done mostly in silence," said Hiio. "But that day was the first mass deportation when all Estonians saw with their own eyes what the new regime meant."
       Estonian leaders have criticized Moscow for not acknowledging Stalinist abuses and also for appearing to glorify Soviet rule.
       Moscow, in turn, has blasted the Baltics for prosecuting Stalinist officials who took part in the deportations, saying they're seeking revenge on ailing old men. Several convicted agents, mostly in their 70s and 80s, have been jailed.
       Meri has backed the prosecutions, saying they help shed light on the dark Stalinist era. But the popular Estonian leader has also sounded conciliatory, saying revenge or bitterness shouldn't enter into Estonian remembrances. 
       "We should not have an emotional relationship with our past, but a rational one where, after suspects have had their day in court, we will also have the chance to forgive," he said in an interview last year. 

Czech President Vaclav Havel has come out forcibly in favor of Baltic NATO membership, saying Russia had nothing to fear from expansion to the region. 
       Speaking at a gathering of leaders from NATO candidate countries in Bratislava during the week, Havel said the issue of Baltic membership was critical, adding he didn't "understand why these three free countries shouldn't be offered membership as soon as possible, especially as they are working hard to be ready for it." 
       He said Russia, which has expressed vehement opposition to NATO expansion, especially to the Baltic states, should have no say in whether the Baltics do or don't get in.
       "Yielding to the geopolitical or geostrategic interests of Russia, or perhaps merely to its concern for its prestige, would be the worst thing that the alliance could do in this respect," he said. "I find it almost absurd that such a large and powerful country [as Russia] should be alarmed by the prospect of three small democratic republics at its borders joining a regional grouping which it does not control."
       Havel, using some of the toughest language ever on the issue by a major European leader, said it was his "profound conviction that Russia does not deserve that we behave towards it as we would toward a leper, an invalid or a child who requires special treatment and whose whims, no matter how dangerous, must be understood and tolerated." 
       He said inviting the Baltic states into NATO "would be the final step in dismantling of the Iron Curtain." 
       A crucial NATO summit is scheduled to be held in the Czech capital Prague next year. Candidate nations hope the alliance will issue formal invitations to prospective members, but NATO leaders haven't yet made any commitments. 
       President Havel said not inviting Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania "would ultimately amount to admitting that Russia's fears of NATO expanding to the three Baltic states are justified and that NATO really harbors aggressive, imperialist and anti-Russian intentions." 
       The Czech Republic is already a NATO member. 

Estonian President Lennart Meri sharply criticized government leaders on May 7 for not doing enough to stem rising unemployment, which has soared to a post-Soviet high of almost 14 percent. 
       Speaking at a local business forum, Meri complained that the fiscally conservative, center-right government didn't have a coherent jobs policy. 
       "The 100,000 unemployed...hope for work. Unfortunately, the government and parliament haven't given them any clear messages on how to abolish unemployment," Meri told an audience made up mostly of Estonian business leaders. 
       The president, whose second and final term ends later this year, didn't offer specific prescriptions from bringing joblessness down, though he said further improving education standards had to be at the core of any jobs creation plan. 
       Years of largely successful reforms, including the restructuring of privatized companies, have also caused major job losses, especially outside the economically vibrant capital, Tallinn; in some rural areas, the jobless rate is now over 20 percent. 
       "The success of the economy is unquestionable. But for this success we have paid a price that is very characteristic to post-communist societies: unemployment and growing inequality in the distribution of wealth," Meri said. 
       While unemployment is generally high, the president said some sectors of the economy had a difficult time finding highly skilled employees.
       "Our Gordian knot, the paradoxical coexistence of unemployment and labor shortage, is already today undermining Estonia's future and its ability to compete, as well as the quality of our products and our life," he said. 
       Meri, who has generally been a strong advocate of Estonian market reforms, also criticized successful businessmen who looked down on their poorer countryman. 
       "Some successful entrepreneurs are spreading the myth that ten years ago, we all had the same starting position. So, those who are rich today have simply worked harder. Those who are poor today only have themselves to blame. This is irresponsible and foolish," he said.

News Highlights from April 30-May 7, 2001

The Latvian hockey team scored a stunning 2-0 upset of the United States in the world championships on May 1 in Germany, though the Latvians later failed to go through to the final rounds. 
       The win in their round robin group was credited by many to Latvian goalie Arturs Irbe's, who plays for the NHL Carolina Hurricanes, after he stopped an impressive 42 shots from the American side. 
       Latvia was the smallest country to qualify for the world championships and its defeat of the mighty U.S. side seemed to fulfill Latvian hopes that their team would prove to be giant killers right through the tournament. 
       But going into their third game against the Ukraine, considered a lesser team compared to the Americans, the Latvian team faltered and lost 4-2. The loss put them out of contention.
       The Latvians also recently qualified for the Winter Olympic Games for the first time since the 1930s. 
       But many of Latvia's star players are in their late- to mid-thirties, and many observers see the Olympics as possibly the teams last chance to shine on the international stage. 

An Estonian resident reportedly couldn't resist the temptation of an all-too-generous bank machine offering him 10,000 times the money on his account. He took the cash, but was quickly arrested.
       The 21-year-old had the equivalent of just 6 dollars in Krediitipank, but withdrew 60,000 over four days ending April 30 following an apparent computer glitch, police spokesman Indrek Raudjalg said. He declined to give the man's name.
       Tipped off by the bank, police searched the suspect's home and said they found virtually all the missing money. The man, arrested
after turning himself in later the same day, could face a maximum eight years in jail for theft. 
       The incident occurred in Narva, a town of some 80,000 people near the Estonian-Russian border. 

Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus has rejected a gambling legalization bill, saying parliament must substantially rework the law before he'll sign it. 
       Legislators approved the law in April, with backers arguing that gambling will boost tax revenues. But Adamkus, among other criticisms, said a planned supervisory body needed more power to prevent money laundering through casinos. 
       The bill, drafted by ruling centrists, was opposed by many right-wing groups, which said it would fuel crime. Opposition Conservatives also said gambling violated moral norms of this predominantly Catholic nation. 
       Parliament has two weeks to discuss the president's proposed changes and to approve revised legislation. The law was slated to take effect July 1; observers say the president doesn't oppose gambling in principle and is likely to sign a slightly reworked law.
       The government estimated that some 6 million dollars could be raised annually through taxes on gambling establishments, revenue which it said could be funneled to schools and other cash-strapped public sectors. 
       Only Lithuania refused to legalize gambling after the three Baltic states regained independence. Some Lithuanians make regular trips to gamble in neighboring Latvia or Estonia.

News Highlights from April 23 to April 30, 2001

Three pro-communist Russian citizens were convicted of terrorism and handed prison terms on April 30 for briefly occupying a Riga church last year and threatening to blow it up with a grenade that turned out to be fake. 
       Sergei Solovyev, 28, and Maxim Zhurkin, 23, received stiff 15-year sentences, while Dmitri Gafarnov, who was under 18 at the time of the incident, received five years. 
       The convictions were the first time since Latvian independence that anyone had been successfully prosecuted on terrorism charges.
       Several supporters of the three men attended the Riga district court session and shouted their disapproval as the verdicts were read out. 
       Lawyers for the defendants argued that the jail terms were out of proportion to the actual crime, in which nobody was injured; they vowed to appeal the ruling. 
       The young men, members of the far-left Russian nationalist group the National Bolsheviks, barricaded themselves in St. Peter's church on November 17, 2000, after climbing the inside of the tower. 
       They said they were protesting Latvia's bid to join the U.S.-led NATO alliance. They also called for the release of Mikhail Farbtuhks, imprisoned in Riga for carrying out Stalinist-era deportations in the 1940s. 
       The men surrendered after several hours when police agreed they could speak by telephone to officials at Russia's Embassy in Riga. 
       The National Bolsheviks group is made up mostly of young Russians from Russia and from Latvia's ethnic Russian minority. They say they oppose Latvian independence and advocate the restoration of the Soviet Union.

A majority foreign-owned consortium signed a deal on April 30 to buy 66 percent of Estonia's key state railway amid accusations that the utility's privatization has been badly mishandled. 
       Baltic Rail Service will purchase the majority stake in Estonian Railway for 57 million dollars, with pledges to invest 285 million dollars more in modernization projects over the next ten years. 
       Estonia's government will retain a 34 percent stake. 
       The otherwise small freight railway, which includes only 600 kilometers of main track, is considered highly lucrative because its tanker cars carry Russian oil products through the Baltic Sea coast nation en route to Western markets.
       Estonia has already privatized hundreds of state-owned companies, including its large power plants and telephone companies. 
       "Today's deal is the last big privatization," said Katrin Kivi, spokeswoman for the Privatization Agency that negotiated the deal with Baltic Rail Service. "After this, we can say Estonia's privatization process is mostly finished."
       But other Estonians were far less enthusiastic about the rail privatization, which has been plagued by lawsuits and charges of shady dealing. Some argue the company is a vital asset and so shouldn't be sold to private investors at all. 
       Prime Minister Mart Laar has been sharply criticized, including by some of his own allies, for the apparently clumsy manner in which the privatization was carried out; some complained there was too little public debate about the selloff. 
        Several hundred protesters rallied Saturday in Tartu, 190 kilometers from Tallinn, against the deal. "Give up this privatization comedy," Ain Kaalep, a leading writer and one of the rally organizers, told the assembled crowd. 
       The Privatization Agency initially announced that it would sign a deal with a consortium called RailEstonia, but talks with it collapsed amid media speculation that the group might rely on illegitimate sources to finance its purchase.
       The agreement, signed Monday in Tallinn by Privatization Agency director Jaak Liivak and Baltic Rail Service chairman Edward Burkhardt, does not require any additional regulatory approval, according to Kivi.
       The privatization spokeswoman added she was confident that continued legal wrangling wouldn't scuttle the deal. 
       The U.S.-based Rail World and Britain's Jarvis International each own 25.5 percent of Baltic Rail Service; the U.S.-based Rail Development Corporation owns five percent, and Estonia's Ganiger owns the remaining 44 percent. 

Analysis—Edward Lucas, Moscow bureau chief for The Economist magazine, searches for new ways of getting under the skin of unreformed Russians. The following appeared in the March-April edition of CITY PAPER:

One of the pleasures of life in Russia for an old cold warrior like me is annoying people nostalgic for the Soviet Union. When Russians ask me, “Have you been in Russia long, Mr. Lucas?” I take great pleasure in giving an answer along the lines of “I've been working on formerly captive nations for 20 years already and was in the Baltic states for the last years of the Soviet occupation.” I love the way people’s faces fall, and it is a great way of starting an argument. About one time in 200, I get a beaming smile of recognition and have made a new friend.
       For the same reason I keep a picture of Stepan Bandera (a war-era Ukrainian nationalist) in my wallet, and whenever I am trying to find some stupid propusk or kartochka for an official, I take pleasure in pulling it out and making whoever it is look at it for half a minute.
       But it was easier in countries where the Communists were better educated about their country’s history. In Czechoslovakia, for example, where I was a correspondent during the bolshevik occupation, just humming Ach synku synku, (the favorite folksong of the Masaryk family) was a subtle way of annoying any of the collaborationist regime who happened to be in earshot.
       I don’t actually know what the favorite tunes of Sakharov, Solzhenitsyn, Akhmatova, Herzen or Kerensky were, but even if I did, I doubt that they would mean much to the people I want to displease. I do carry a small copy of Solzhenitsyn’s One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch around as a sort of talisman against anyone I meet in planes or queues who thinks that things were better under Uncle Joe. But it is not enough—especially at a time of increasing Soviet restorationism. Particularly on my mind is that ghastly Soviet anthem, which the appalling gang of creeps and crooks currently residing in the Kremlin have now disgraced their country with.
       Russians love mobile phones, and for some time I have been trying to think how to use the ringing tone as a way of opening a new front. But I haven’t been able to think of a tune that is sufficiently familiar and provocative.
       God Save the Czar is certainly one in the ear for the Communists, but Czarist rule was pretty bad for the then captive nations (not least the Baltic states), and a lot of nasty Russians have switched effortlessly from left-wing imperialism to the traditional Russian nationalist sort, and would probably find the tune rather nice. I thought of trying to download the Estonian/Finnish national anthem (which have the same tune), but some people might find it disrespectful.
       I had a brainwave, however. All I need is a technical whiz kid (is someone at Elcoteq reading this? My e-mail is moscow@economist.com). My ideal mobile phone ringing tone will start off with a jazzy rendering of the Soviet (and now Russian) anthem, which will nicely catch the attention of the target audience—and then, after a few bars, speed up, become heavily distorted, and fade away, leaving only the familiar dots and dashes of the best known Morse code signal in the world: SOS (three short beeps, three long, three short.) Louder, louder, and louder.
       It won’t do any good, of course. But next time I interview someone important from the Kremlin I’ll be able to enjoy leaving my phone switched on—and well buried at the bottom of my bag to let the tune play in full.

News Highlights from April 16 to April 23, 2001

A prominent Italian businessman living in Estonia was shot dead in the capital's old city on the morning of April 23, prompting calls from the prime minister for quick action to capture his killer. 
       Salvatore Grasso, 47, was shot four times in the chest with a low-caliber pistol; witnesses said there was a lone assailant wearing a dark leather jacket and cap, according to Estonian police spokesman Indrek Raudjalg. 
       The murder occurred around 10 a.m. on a cobblestone street in the medieval quarter, near the acclaimed Controvento Italian restaurant that the victim owned. Grasso, a popular figure in the tiny Italian ex-pat community in Estonia, died at the scene. 
       Police wouldn't speculate about possible motives for the Monday attack. 
       Prime Minister Mart Laar called on authorities to diligently investigate the killing. 
       Police have blamed several murders over the years on competing gangs fighting to control lucrative illegal enterprises. But killings of established, well-known businessmen have been relatively rare.
       In another high-profile murder last month, however, a publisher of a Russian-language newspaper, 57-year-old Vitali Haitov, was shot and killed outside his home. There have been no arrests in his murder. 

An artist in Lithuania has completed a labyrinthine complex fashioned from 3,000 Soviet-made television sets, saying it's a monument to what he called the idiocy of the communist system. 
       There is a statue of Soviet founder Vladimir Lenin near the entrance of the exhibit, and tunnels made of the old televisions stacked two meters high shoot off in different directions; some lead to dead ends.
       Sculptor Gintaras Karosas said at a ceremonial unveiling of the work on April 19 that he wanted the imposing structure to make people feel uncomfortable, in the same way, he explained, that they did under totalitarian communist rule. 
       The 10,000-square-meter structure, which took two years and 25,000 dollars to build, is located at the Europa Park (also known as the Center of Europe Park) some 25 kilometers outside Vilnius. Money for the project was raised through donations.

A top European Union official on April 20 defended a controversial proposal to deny laborers from the Baltic states and other Eastern Europe countries the right to settle and work elsewhere in the union for up to seven years after their countries join.
       Guenter Verheugen, the EU's enlargement commissioner, rejected criticism from some nations, including some observers in the Baltic states, that the plan could relegate new members to second-class status. 
       "This is absolutely not justified," Verheugen told a news conference at the end of a three-day visit to Estonia. "In practice, I don't think these restrictions are strong." 
       Verheugen said the proposal was the first time the EU had gone out of its way to request a transition period compared to hundreds of requests for transitions from EU candidates themselves. 
       "We do not see the 500 requests from the candidate countries as a slap in our face, so candidate countries must not see this as one," he said. 
       Under current EU law, nationals of member states can settle anywhere in the union if language is no problem and they have the right job qualifications.
       But the EU, citing fears of some member states about an influx of workers, proposed recently that East European workers be kept out for five years after their countries enter; a two-year extension would be possible. 
       Verheugen said the proposal permits individual EU states to activate the free movement of labor provisions bilaterally with any new member if they chose. 
       Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Cyprus, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Bulgaria, Romania, Malta, and Slovakia are now negotiating entry into the EU. Turkey is a 13th candidate, but membership negotiations will not open soon.
       Malta and Cyprus would be exempted from any transition deal for workers under the EU proposal.
       While in Tallinn, Verheugen also addressed growing EU skepticism in Estonia head on, arguing that the nation of 1.4 million would suffer economically if it chose to stay out of the powerful bloc. 
       Public support for membership has fallen below 30 percent, a record low, according to a poll released this week by Estonia's Saar agency. It surveyed 1000 people between March and April; the margin of error was under 4 percent. 
       "Without membership Estonia would not be a less attractive place for investment, it would be a non-place," said the EU official. "Estonia's attractive because behind Estonia you have the single largest internal market of the world (the EU)," he said.
       He also argued that the Baltic states, which still have security concerns vis-a-vis Russia, would be more secure within the EU. 
       "The EU is certainly not a military alliance, but it is a security
producer," he said. "For Estonia, being a member of the EU, the security situation will improve. Members of the EU are basically immune from pressure from abroad."

News Highlights from April 9-April 16, 2001

Estonian Prime Minister Mart Laar on April 11 survived a no-confidence vote initiated by opposition leaders who accused him of ignoring rising unemployment and botching the privatization of a key railway. 
       The no-confidence motion was rejected by 51 deputies in the 101-seat Riigikogu parliament, all of whom belong to parties in the ruling coalition government; 43 voted for, and seven members weren't present. The motion needed 51 votes to pass. 
       While Estonia’s economy expanded rapidly after it regained independence, unemployment has risen sharply, especially in rural areas, and now stands at a post-Soviet high of some 13 percent.
       Laar told parliament before the vote that his center-right government has imposed budgetary discipline and spurred new economic growth. But he conceded it had made mistakes and he pledged to devote more attention to social welfare issues. 
       The 40-year-old is associated with radical reforms and is a lightning rod of criticism for many farmers, elderly and poor who say new prosperity in some sectors hasn't benefited them; critics accuse him of being cavalier and cold-hearted. 
       "We have reached a situation where the government's inaction and ineptitude in solving the problems of the Estonian state and people can no longer be tolerated," opposition groups said in a statement prior to Wednesday's vote.
       Backers credit Laar with taking the politically difficult, and unpopular steps that salvaged what appeared to be a moribund economy during his first stint as premier in the early '90s and praise his current, two-year-old Cabinet for moving Estonia closer to European Union membership. 
       But even allies cringed at the government’s recent attempts to sell-off the Eesti Raudtee railway—a privatization process that has been plagued by lawsuits and charges of insider dealing. The firm's considered highly lucrative because its tanker cars carry Russian oil products through Estonia to Western markets. 
       Political pressure on Laar began to increase in February following allegations he shot at a picture of leftist opposition leader Edgar Savisaar for target practice during an official visit to a military school in 1999.
       The reports at first provoked laughter but turned serious after Laar seemed to deny the incident, then admitted that something of the sort had happened and apologized. Savisaar's populist Center Party said Laar's apparent equivocation called his trustworthiness into question. 
       Savisaar, a self-declared champion of the poor who has been embroiled in several serious scandals himself, is bitterly disliked and distrusted by many Estonians. His party is parliament's largest with 27 seats, but other major parties have ruled out working with him. 
       The ruling coalition led by Laar includes his center-right Pro Patria, the center-right Reform Party and the centrist Moderates. 

Lithuania’s parliament on April 12 voted to legalize gambling for the first time, with backers arguing the industry will boost state tax revenues and critics saying it's immoral. 
       The gambling bill, approved by the Seimas parliament by a 72-to-22 vote, is slated to come into effect on July 1 this year. President Valdas Adamkus is expected to sign the legislation within a few weeks, making it law. 
       Ruling centrist parties drafted the measure, which permits casinos, bingo, lotteries and betting on sports. But opposition Conservatives opposed it, saying it violated moral norms of this predominantly Catholic nation. 
       Former parliament chairman and Lithuanian independence hero Vytautas Landsbergis, along with several other Conservative deputies, marched out of the legislative hall in protest as deputies prepared to vote Thursday. 
       Critics say gambling will fuel organized crime. Others said voting on the controversial issue as Lithuanian Christians prepared to celebrate Easter and Good Friday was offensive.
       The government estimated that nearly 7 million dollars could be raised annually through taxes on gambling establishments; it said that money could be funneled to schools and other cash-strapped public sectors.
       Only Lithuania refused to legalize gambling after the three Baltic states regained independence in 1991. Some Lithuanians made regular trips to Latvia or Estonia to gamble there. 

A 94-year-old Lithuanian composer, his work largely forgotten or ignored in the six decades since he fled the Soviet occupation, was recently honored for the first time in his adopted country of the United States. 
       Jeronimas Kacinskas, who had conducted the Vilnius Philharmonic Orchestra and the Vilnius State Opera before World War II, escaped his Lithuanian homeland in 1944 as Red Army troops invaded. He eventually ended up in Boston, Massachusetts, where he led a relatively low-key life as a church organist and later as a music professor.
       Many of his celebrated pre-war compositions were lost or destroyed during the war, and he was a relative unknown in professional musical circles in Boston.
       Students and colleagues of his at the Berklee College of Music in Boston, however, sought to put the spotlight on his work as a composer by organizing a gala concert on April 8. The orchestra performed recent compositions by Kacinskas and also one entitled  Nonetto, which was written in 1938 and then lost. It was painstakingly reconstructed after fragments of the work were found in a Czech library.
       A Boston Globe review praised the compositions as "well-crafted...shapely, nicely varied in color, mood and articulation." It added that "one can understand that Kacinskas's music—iconoclastic, personal, forward-looking—may not have been Stalin's cup of tea. But why it never became Boston’s cup of tea is the real mystery."

The Helsinki Stock Exchange on April 9 bought a controlling 52 percent stake in Estonia's sole shares market, the Tallinn Stock Exchange, for over 1 million dollars. 
       Tallinn Stock Exchange spokeswoman Eva Palu said she was delighted that the deal, first announced in February, had been sealed, saying that it should invigorate Estonia’s relatively flat shares market.
       "Helsinki's exchange is a leader in Europe, and if you consider the close relations between our countries, this deal makes sense," she said in Tallinn, 90 kilometers south of the Finnish capital across the Baltic Sea. 
       Finland is Estonia's No. 1 export market, and Finns are among the top five foreign investors in this Baltic state of 1.4 million.
       Palu said the aim was to fully integrate Tallinn into the Helsinki Stock Exchange trading network by the end of this year. She said this will substantially increase the visibility of Estonian companies to brokers around the world. 
       Helsinki is one of the world's most international exchanges with foreign investors owning some 70 percent of its value. Trading more than doubled last year to an average daily volume of almost 1 billion dollars. 
       Estonians have been looking for ways to enliven their exchange ever since it opened its doors in 1995.
       After a 1996-97 boom, share prices fell sharply and never fully recovered. Average daily trading volumes were just 1.2 million
dollars last year and trading focuses mainly on two companies, Hansapank and Estonian Telekom. 
       Estonia's government is slated to sell additional shares to the Helsinki group within several weeks, raising its stake in the Tallinn exchange to 57 percent. Its other major owners are Estonia's two leading banks, Hansapank and Uhispank. 
       Last year, Tallinn's bourse said would join the Nordic Stock Exchange, or Norex, uniting the Stockholm and Copenhagen exchanges. But it jettisoned those plans when it cut its deal with Helsinki, considered a bitter rival of Norex.
       Tallinn Stock Exchange head Gert Tiivas said last month that he was confident the move to hook up with Helsinki was the right one, saying it was consistent with a strategy of wanting to link Estonia's bourse with larger ones in Europe.
       "For a small economy, it's so hard to reach the critical mass to create good capital markets," he said. "If this move doesn't help, then we don't understand anything about business and it'll be time for someone else to take over."

Some politicians may dream of becoming an icon one day, but at the relatively young age of 40, Estonian Prime Minister Mart Laar is already one—literally. The Ukrainian Greek Orthodox Church in Tallinn, that is, recently painted the leader’s image on an icon gracing one of the church walls. 
       Congregation heads said the icon, dominated by the figure of Mother Mary—her hands outstretched towards the prime minister—is partly meant to convey hopes for ever greater harmony between ethnic Estonians and the country’s large number of Russian-speakers; a small girl from Estonia’s Ukrainian minority stands just below the prime minister to the right.
       Clergy also said that the icon is believed to bestow blessings on those who appear in it—which might do the premier some good at this particular stage in his political career. His popularity ratings have fallen to new lows of late, so he can use all the help he can get.

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