Estonia Country Profile

A small and heavily forested country, Estonia is the most northerly of the three former Soviet Baltic republics.

Not much more than a decade after it regained its independence following the collapse of the USSR, the republic was welcomed as an EU member in May 2004. The move came just weeks after it joined NATO.

These historic developments would have been extremely hard to imagine in not-so-distant Soviet times.

Estonia was part of the Russian empire until 1918 when it proclaimed its independence. Russia recognised it as an independent state under the 1920 Treaty of Tartu.

During the two decades that followed it tried to assert its identity as a nation squeezed between the rise of Nazism in Germany and the dominion of Stalin in the USSR.

After a pact between Hitler and Stalin, Soviet troops arrived in 1940 and Estonia was absorbed into the Soviet Union. Nazi forces pushed the Soviets out in 1941 but the Red Army returned in 1944 and remained for half a century.

The rapidly expanding Soviet planned economy brought hundreds of thousands of Soviet immigrants to Estonia, causing widespread fear among Estonians that their national identity would eventually vanish.

Russians account for up to a third of the population.

The legacy of the Soviet years has left a mark which the country carries with it into its EU era: Many Russian-speakers complain of discrimination, saying strict language laws make it hard to get jobs or citizenship without proficiency in Estonian. Some Russian-speakers who were born in Estonia are either unable or unwilling to become citizens because of the language requirements.

After a decade of negotiations, Estonia and Russia signed a treaty defining the border between the two countries in May 2005. The Estonian parliament ratified it soon afterwards but only after it had introduced reference to Soviet occupation. Moscow reacted by pulling out of the treaty and saying talks would have to start afresh.

The Estonian language is closely related to Finnish but not to the languages of either of the other Baltic republics, Latvia and Lithuania, or to Russian. The country has unique traditions in folk song and verse, traditions which have had to be strong to survive the many centuries of domination by foreign countries.

Estonia has enjoyed strong economic growth in recent years.

FACTS

Full name: Republic of Estonia
Population: 1.3 million (UN, 2007)
Capital: Tallinn
Area: 45,227 sq km (17,462 sq km)
Major languages: Estonian, Russian
Major religion: Christianity
Life expectancy: 66 years (men), 77 years (women) (UN)
Monetary unit: 1 kroon = 100 sents
Main exports: Machinery, textiles, wood products
GNI per capita: US $13,200 (World Bank, 2007)
Internet domain: .ee
International dialling code: + 372

Timeline

A chronology of key events:

1934 – Prime Minister Konstantin Pats leads bloodless coup and establishes authoritarian rule.

1938 – Pats becomes president under new constitution.

1939 – The Soviet Union compels Estonia to accept Soviet military bases.

1940 June – Soviet troops march in.

1940 August – Estonia incorporated into Soviet Union.

1941 – German troops invade.

1944 – Estonia reannexed by the Soviet Union. Tens of thousands of Estonians deported to Siberia and Central Asia.

1988 – Popular Front campaigns for democracy. “Singing revolution” brings a third of the population together in a bid for national unity and self-determination.

Independence

1991 – Communist rule collapses. Soviet government recognizes the independence of the Baltic republics.

1992 – Lennart Meri becomes president.

1994 – Russian troops leave. Estonia joins Partnership for Peace, allowing limited military cooperation with Nato.

1996 – President Meri re-elected.

1997 - Estonia invited to begin European Union membership negotiations.

1999- New centre-right government under Prime Minister Mart Laar, who led a previous government in 1992.

2000 – Estonia and Russia expel diplomats in tit-for-tat moves over spying claims.

2001 October – Former member of the Central Committee of the Soviet-era Communist Party Arnold Ruutel sworn in as president.

2001 December – President Ruutel signs into law a bill scrapping the requirement for candidates for public office to be proficient in the Estonian language.

2002 January – Mart Laar resigns as prime minister after squabbling within ruling coalition.

Siim Kallas becomes prime minister in a new coalition government in which his Reform Party shares power with Centre Party.

2002 November – Nato summit in Prague includes Estonia on list of countries formally invited to join the alliance.

Nato, EU membership

2002 December – EU summit in Copenhagen formally invites Estonia to join.

2003 April – President Ruutel invites Res Publica leader Juhan Parts to be premier in coalition government with Reform Party and People’s Union following elections the previous month.

2003 September – Estonians vote overwhelmingly to join the European Union in a referendum.

2004 March – Estonia admitted to Nato.

2004 May – Estonia is one of 10 new states to join the EU.

2004 November – Defence Minister Margus Hanson resigns after classified documents are stolen from his home.

2005 February – Foreign Minister Kristiina Ojuland is sacked after classified documents are found to be missing from ministry.

2005 March – President Ruutel declines invitation to attend Moscow celebrations in May marking the anniversary of the end of World War II.

Prime Minister Parts submits government’s resignation after vote of no confidence in Justice Minister Ken-Marti Vaher over tough anticorruption programme.

2005 April – Reform Party’s Andrus Ansip confirmed as prime minister.

Tensions with Russia

2005 May – Estonia and Russia sign treaty delimiting border.

2005 June – Parliament ratifies border treaty with Russia but defies warnings from Moscow by introducing amendment referring to Soviet occupation. Russia reacts by withdrawing from treaty.

2006 May – Parliament ratifies EU constitution.

2006 September – Toomas Hendrik Ilves, a former foreign minister, is elected president.

2007 February – Parliament passes a law prohibiting the display of monuments glorifying Soviet rule, paving the way for the removal of a controversial Red Army war memorial in Tallinn.

2007 March – Estonia becomes the first country to allow internet voting for national parliamentary elections. The prime minister’s Reform Party wins by a narrow margin.

2007 April – Authorities remove a controversial Red Army war memorial in Tallinn. One person is killed and more than 40 injured as protesters, mostly ethnic Russians, try to halt the removal. Russia warns of serious consequences.