Clashes over the relocation of Tallinn war memorial
(19)Police fired tear gas and rubber bullets during last night’s clashes with mainly ethnic Russian looters and vandals.
For two nights, the whole centre of Tallinn has been an arena of confrontation between police and thousands of looting protesters.
Wide scale riots started Thursday evening with a protest against the removal of a Soviet war memorial.
Within hours it turned into insane looting of cars and buildings causing 1.3 million euros worth of damage on the first night.
When riot broke out, the government held an emergency meeting and decided to remove the statue immediately to avoid further conflict.
The monument was removed in the early hours of Friday and was taken to a classified location. The statue will be re-erected in a war cemetery.
Under the previous site are the graves of 14 Soviet soldiers, whose remainswill be also re-buried in the cemetery.
The Prime Minister of Estonia, Andrus Ansip, has said that the dead should be buried properly in a cemetery, not in an arbitrary place in the heart of the city.
Estonian officials have said that the monument had to be moved to a cemetery because the site attracted both Russian and Estonian nationalists.
On Saturday, the exhumation started after prayers said by Russian Orthodox and Lutheran clergymen.
So far, one killing has been registered, along with 153 injuries and 800 arrests.
On Thursday night, a man was stabbed to death by another rioter. As the police were not present when the crime took place, the killer has not been captured yet.
Most of the 153 injuries are not very serious – they were caused by people injuring themselves while breaking shop windows and destroying bus stops.
Of the 800 arrested, 64 people will be held for further investigation.
On Friday there were reports of looting and rioting in north-eastern towns such as Jõhvi, Narva and Kohtla-Järve. These settlements are inhabited largely by the ethnic Russian community.
Among the injured were 29 police.
The police are employing fairly harsh methods as the protesters are extremely aggressive and violent. On Friday night, there was a situation in which police were forced to back away from one clash area. Later, police managed to re-establish control of the problematic street and park.
Female police have been more seriously injured, probably because they are physically weaker and therefore it is easier for protesters to attack them.
A simplified explanation of the oppositions on the streets of Tallinn is as follows: ethnic Russians fighting against the police and less frequently, Estonian groups. The police, whose interest is in restoring public order, are arresting aggressive people from both sides.
Journalists too have been under attack several times, and a group of protesters attacked one female photographer for an Estonian daily newspaper. Rioters also robbed a Swedish TV operator of his camera.
The reasons why media representatives have been attacked are simple – pictures and videos can be used later by police to identify the criminals who looted shops or started a fight.
On Friday, the mayor of Tallinn banned the sale of alcohol until 2 May. This caused lots of marauders to attack alcohol stores.
Looters were not only interested of smashing shop windows, but also in stealing goods from there. Protesters preferred to attack shops which sell famous and expensive products.
On Thursday night, the Hugo Boss store was attacked – within minutes everything there was robbed. Friday night was the turn of Giorgio Armani shop, which was also looted and completely robbed within minutes.
On Friday night, rioters also attacked the National Opera and the Estonian Academy of Arts. The biggest bookstore in Old Town also came under attack.
Many ethnic Russian businessmen and academics have strongly condemned the rioting on the streets.
Most Estonian citizens are absolutely sure that the memorial symbolised Soviet occupation.
Supporters of the monument are disappointed and angry because the statue has been taken away. They claim that the memorial celebrated the Red Army’s victory over Nazi Germany, not the occupation of Estonia.
A large Russian population was brought to Estonia after World War II. Basically they replaced tens of thousands of Estonians who were killed and deported by the Soviet Union.
Estonia gained independence from Czarist Russia in 1918.
22 years later, in 1940, Estonia was forcibly incorporated into the Soviet Union. A year later the Nazis occupied Estonia.
In 1944 Estonia was again incorporated into the Soviet Union who chased Nazi forces away.
The Soviet occupation lasted almost 50 years, but in 1991 Estonia regained its independence.
The Estonian population is 1.3 million, a quarter of whom are ethnic Russians. Tallinn is home to 400,000 people, about half of them ethnic Russians.
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