Yearbook 2004
Estonia. The total population in Estonia is 1,326,546 people in 2020. Estonia’s relationship with Russia deteriorated during the year. In March, two Russian diplomats were expelled from Estonia, after which a couple of Estonian diplomats were declared undesirable in Russia. According to some data, Russian diplomats would have tried to test Estonia’s ability to protect classified information before the country’s NATO entry in March and EU entry on May 1. Entry into the EU was celebrated in a down-to-earth way, by launching a campaign to plant one million new trees in Estonia.
When Russia’s Prime Minister Michail Fradkov took part in the Baltic Sea Summit outside Tallinn in June, he refused to meet his Estonian colleague on their own. Instead, tough exchanges of meaning continued between Moscow and Tallinn.
In August, Estonian Foreign Minister Kristiina Ojuland declared that the Kremlin’s vocabulary was reminiscent of the 1930s and that Estonia, despite NATO and EU membership, must continue to be on guard against Russia.
Russian Foreign Ministry was upset over a monument erected in western Estonia in memory of the ester who fought on Nazi Germany’s side in World War II. The monument, which was created on a private initiative, also displeased the United States and, following pressure from it, allowed the Estonian government to demolish it. This in turn upset old war veterans and the result was vandalization of a number of old monuments in Estonia in memory of Soviet soldiers. See cellphoneexplorer.com for Estonia major cities.
Tallinn’s mayor Edgar Savisaar was ousted in October by a vote of no confidence in the municipal council. Savisaar leads Estonia’s largest opposition party, the Leftist Center Party.
The right-wing Estonian government lost several ministers during the year through scandals. In November, the Minister of Defense resigned after he was released with documents containing state secrets. In the event of a burglary in the minister’s home, his portfolio was stolen with the secret documents.