Estonia says 'ei' to geological survey by Gazprom.
Mart Laar collects respect, future votes.
Baltic Times says Russia doesn't deserve anything from Estonia.
Buck is passed back to Finland.
Russia is unhappy. What else is new.
Does Savisaar look better to the EU?
Your thoughts?
24 kommentaari:
As a self proclaimed Russia Expert (My main credential being the fact that I once used to be married to a russian woman) I recommend an extremely tough stance with Russia:
1) Tartu Rahu acceptance.
2) Cessation of all hostilites such as propaganda and cyber wars, meddling with WWII history and rousing our Russian populace.
3) Return of the Setu territories.
4) Normalization of trade relations.
5) Estonia shall have her own valve that allows Estonians to control the flow of gas.
6) Estonia shall recveive a fair share of gas and tolls from the enterprise.
7) Gasprom military convoys shall not be allowed to enter Estonian territorial waters. Any violation to this is to be viewed as a hostile act and serve as grounds to the immediate soppage of gas flow.
You can not ever afford to be lenient with Russians. I wish our government would have the balls to demand all or at least some of what I listed above.
I'd like a little Tartu Rahu acceptance. That'd be great.
Hey, did you notice how Finland basically did the same thing and no one noticed.
They muttered something about "rocky seabed" and "maybe try a little bit farther south".
Now Estonia will be made out to be the naughty boy again.
As for the Finns, if THEY got any balls, now's the time for them to open their pudrumulgad' and make some noise about getting Karelia back.
This picture is quite telling. Check out how Schroeder is acting like he's some kinda Putya's buddy. He'd better take a close look at that cold and knowing Hannibal Lecter-like smirk on Pooty-poot's face. He does not knwo Rooskies. Not yet.
Finns* call that thing "Gepu-Vova sopimus" (in a slightly less familiar language, tha would be: Gerhard-Vladimir pact).
It is also interesting to see that in Helsingin Sanomat that news was under the rubric of "Kotimaa" (homeland), not "Ulkomaat" (foreign countries), see: http://www.hs.fi/uutiset/
Sry, but these are kind of populists comments a-lá Savisaar to me...
I'd never gamble economic interests of my country for some ridiculous political motives. I'd suggest learning from Finnland. They do it just right: cooperate against resist. And cash, by the way. Eastern Europeans claim about Russia - Scandinavia earns easy coin all the time... Yeah, baby...
Believe me, it will not last for a long time until a Finnish joint venture of Nord Stream will be founded, as another contribution to Finnland's GDP (smartly stolen from the Baltic neighborhood). If not, another favor will come up, like a special trading agreement or something.
Just the way they do from the very beginning of the 90's since communists failed... You argue, they cash.
Think about it.
Regards,
random
For those who read Russian. Local liberals enjoy themselves :D
http://mahtrasass.livejournal.com/69538.html
yet another case of differentiating between "government" and "the people". Same thing with the US, btw. I really really do not like what either the Russian or the US governments are doing recently. the Russian one being slightly more dangerous for Estonia;)
but, anyway, about the Nord Stream. I must say Ansip had a hard decision there. I'm not at all surprised at the patriotic blather (which does indeed ring in my heart too, but you can't run a nation according to your feelings) from IRL. and Ansip=Ref had a chance here to extend an olive branch to Russia... I think there are two reasons though for why he didn't: 1) a LOT of his potental voters would have been very unhappy indeed 2)there's only one way to deal with the Russian Government - pretend it's a big bully. How do you deal with a bully? you either take the beatings and give him your lunch money or you stand up to him. There is no middle way. 'course, Estonia being as small as it is and Russia being as big as it is I can't really see us winning. Now if Gazprom was 51% GERMAN, and they were as belligerent as Russians now, the whole world would go up in arms because those "Jewkillers" were at it again.
unfair is what it is. and stupidly consistently always boiling down to the same thing: there can be only one Ultimate Evil and that, for the "civilized world" is Hitler=Germany. Which the Germans really don't deserve anymore, I think they've had enough of Humble Pie in the last 60 years. But Humble Pie is just the thing I'd perscribe to the Russian administration.
The russkies defy all logic and common sense. As far as Europe is concerned, they are a black box. To find out what makes the black box tick, it must be stimulated and responses studied. This is where Estonia comes in. Estonia must act as Europe's vanguard and from time to time prod the bear, so as to speak, and let the EU carefully observe the russkie reaction. This way russkie behaviour may become clearer, and their limits ascertained.
The affair with the Bronze goon was a good starting point. Experiment #1, if you will. But that was only the beginning. The russkie pipeline fiasco will be very interesting indeed.
I'd never gamble economic interests of my country for some ridiculous political motives. I'd suggest learning from Finnland. They do it just right: cooperate against resist. And cash, by the way.
Why does it all have to be in one economic zone or another?
The thing about Karelia is that a clear majority of Finns absolutely don't want it back. Have you seen it? Throughly ruined, any building that looks half-decent is from the Finnish times. Then there's is the fact - and this will not sound very politically correct - it is currently populated and that population is deemed not to be very welcome to Finland. So, yeah, we have learned to be quite Macchiavellian, the education was provided by Stalin. But isn't it kind of elegant how the problem has been disposed so far... Of course in any rational world EU would have a unified voice in matters such as these and no solo playing would be possible - and by far the biggest sinner here is Germany, not Finland. They have apparently good experience of bilateral agreements with Moscow...
Why does it all have to be in one economic zone or another?
I think it's simple business calculation. The pipeline is cheaper if you build it just straight away. Building it straight away unfortunately implicates it should lead through Estonian or Finnish territorial waters, so they started digging the governments.
As Estonians are still playing a princess on a bean instead of producing pure cash out of this, Nord Stream will go to Finland, it needs this engagement on the labour market.
Giustino,
Check this out: http://exhibition.ipvnews.org/page_01.php
As Estonians are still playing a princess on a bean instead of producing pure cash out of this, Nord Stream will go to Finland, it needs this engagement on the labour market.
Russia needs to kiss Estonia's ass a bit more. And how come no one criticized Suomi when they said that their waters were too rocky and suggested Estonia instead?
And how can Russia honestly accuse Estonia of politicizing the request, when Nord Stream's chairman in Gerhard Schroeder and the first person to criticize Estonia is Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
How could any decision *not* be political? And if Estonia did have good reasons to decline the request would they ever be respected?
It seems a bit, hmm, arrogant that Germany and Russia planned this pipeline without getting approval from Estonia or Finland first.
Read it yourself, they say it will be built, no matter what. But if Finland said no, then what? This is an awkward situation. If this is an EU project, then it should be up to Brussels -- not Berlin and Tallinn and Helsinki -- to figure it out.
@Blogaddict
ach, come on... that's what i call populism. go to google pics, enter "us troops children" or "israel palestina children" and you'll get the same set of pics. where's the point?
@Giustino
well, i guess you didn't get the point... you're 100% right that the pipeline will be built no matter what... the issue is that finns will manage somehow get positive things (~cash) out of this - even if some of them consider the whole thing as bad - whereas estonians not. that's it.
regards,
random
A Russian child asked me someting in Russian and I think he said something about pipline and he was nearly ten years old. I shouted at him and broke a beer bottle on the concrete before him to startle the litle bast... I said speak Estonian and denounce Putin you little bast... The child was in fact Estonian and his mother was very upset at me and so was my wife
What do you want, doppelgänger?
nothing is free:
we got your joke already. We might be fascists, but we know irony. Your posts, which seemed witty at first, are now losing some of their freshness. Read Daniil Harms while looking for new ideas.
@blogaddict
here, mate, got a good website for ya... scroll through to the edn as it's getting harder...
http://www.fotos.geschichtsthemen.de/iraq-war/iraq.htm
Seems Sweden is opposing the project too.
HTip to A Step At a Time
it's almost finland's responsibility to deal with this problem. the russians want to run a pipe from viipuri to germany. kind of funny this used to be part of finland. i guess that'd be another reason they don't want karelia back.
if the this was an EU energy issue (as the nord-stream website suggests) the brussels WOULD be dealing with it, and the pipeline WOULD be taking a land route, via lithuania or somewhere.
the fact is, this is a bilateral agreement between germany and russia, and has nothing to do with the EU. perhaps there are people in germany who haven't noticed the EU is a bit bigger than it used to be... or simply some people who think they can get cheaper gas or make more money dealing directly. kind of craps all over european solidarity myth.
sorry for arrogance, but we ARE the eu!
oh, i forgot... i consider myself german and, yes, i wish i could cover my heating bills also in future...
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