“I think it’s very important to remember those crimes and we see that Russia’s playbook hasn’t changed,” said Prime Minister Kallas. “We see the same kind of atrocities happening in Ukraine and I think we have to remember so that we can also deal with the crimes that are also happening right now, and we can
demand accountability.”
Poland and Estonia have both suffered as victims of Soviet crimes. The Baltic state lost one-fifth of its population due to deportations to Siberia or in executions, which, as was the case with Poland, targeted the political, military, cultural, and economic elites of the society.
“After the Second World War, we had a Nuremberg Tribunal for the Nazi crimes and so the Nazi crimes were widely condemned all across the world. Everybody knows,” Kallas said.
“And the German people got to know about the crimes that were committed in their name.
There was never a Moscow tribunal for the crimes committed in Katyn, or in Ukraine, or Baltic countries,” she added, reiterating the need to work on accountability for the crimes Russia is perpetrating in Ukraine now “so [that] these crimes don’t happen again.”
Under Kallas, Estonia doubled down on its effort to decommunize its public spaces, with Poland following in its footsteps. The Estonian government’s police earned itself the wrath of the Kremlin, which issued an arrest warrant for Kallas’s arrest.
“Yes, I got a lot of congratulations for that,” Kallas replied when asked whether she takes pride in coming into the crosshairs of the Russian regime but added in a more serious tone that it carries certain ominous undertones, specifically a message that says “
they [Russians] don’t recognize Poland or Estonia as real countries, because they put us on the most wanted list because of the laws that are applicable in Russia, not in Estonia or in Poland. That is the message they want to send.”
Russia is doing what it can to threaten and provoke Poland and the Baltic states. The Estonian PM said that NATO membership provides security, which means Russia’s conflict with NATO has not devolved into a conventional war.
“But
what we have is a ‘shadow war’ that is going on against our societies, like using migration as a weapon towards Poland or intensive cyberattacks against different Estonian sites and our e-government structures,” Kallas said. “And information warfare that is going on everywhere to really undermine the trust in our societies. That we have to be aware of.”
Kallas stressed the “very good relations” between Tallinn and Warsaw and how she and Polish Prime Minister Tusk “are very likeminded on very many issues.” She also stressed that Poland, being the largest country on NATO’s eastern flank is a country Estonians “definitely look up to” and would like to see it represented in various bodies where “big countries discuss issues,” which would mean Warsaw can serve as the region’s spokesperson.
But responding to why Estonia supports Dutch Prime Minister Rutte as a candidate for the Secretary General of NATO, she responded that while “of course, that was our wish” especially considering Poland is among the members of the alliance that spend at least 2% of GDP being spent on defense, which is “giving a signal that they take defense seriously and they take the situation seriously,” she nevertheless pointed out that “in alliances, we have to work on compromises that everybody has to agree to.”
Kallas, who went on to participate in consultations hosted by Prime Minister Tusk in Warsaw, said that while security and defense policy were of primary importance, another important matter to discuss was the “very important competition issues: how to be more competitive as an economy in Europe.”
