In Estonia, a glimpse into the reach of the Russian World - Globe & Mail

In Estonia, a glimpse into the reach of the Russian World - Globe & Mail (3)

Eestlased Eestis | 07 Mar 2015 | EWR

Spectators watch a tank during a parade as part of an event to celebrate 97 years since first achieving independence in 1918 on February 24 in Narva, Estonia.(RAIGO PAJULA/AFP/Getty Images) - pics/2015/03/44536_001.jpg — Spectators watch a tank during a parade as part of an event to celebrate 97 years since first achieving independence in 1918 on February 24 in Narva, Estonia.
(RAIGO PAJULA/AFP/Getty Images)

MARK MacKINNON, The Globe and Mail

Elvira Nyman walks each day along the ancient fortifications that mark the end of the European Union, as well as tiny Estonia’s border with Russia. What she sees across the narrow Narva River is a “strong country,” she says, with a “beauty” of a leader, President Vladimir Putin.

Ms. Nyman resides in Estonia, but lives in a world created for her by Kremlin-controlled television news. In the mind of the 77-year-old retired laboratory technician, and many others in this Russian-speaking corner of Estonia, it’s the West that’s to blame for the war in Ukraine. Crimea always belonged to Russia. Boris Nemtsov was shot dead in the centre of Moscow last week because he was involved in some shady business that had nothing to do with his political opposition to Mr. Putin.

The city of Narva became part of the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) along with the rest of Estonia 11 years ago. But with 94 per cent of the city’s 60,000 residents identifying themselves as Russian-speakers, Narva also remains firmly part of what the Kremlin calls the Russkiy Mir, or the “Russian World.”

When Kremlin-owned media offered a slew of eyebrow-raising theories this week for Mr. Nemtsov’s murder, the goal was not to convince politicians or viewers in the West of their narrative. The goal was to provide a version that Mr. Putin’s supporters in the Russkiy Mir can cling to.

Through its television channels, the Kremlin has retained the hearts and minds of not only the majority of its own citizens, but also many Russian-speakers in places such as Narva that were left outside the borders of the Russian Federation when the Soviet Union fell 24 years ago. What was viewed as a political nuisance by the governments of Estonia, along with other ex-Soviet republics who inherited these pro-Moscow populations, is now seen as a major security threat, providing the Kremlin with a potential platform to destabilize its neighbours as Russia’s confrontation with the West continues to grow.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com...

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Mart13 Mar 2015 08:42

If you follow the link, you will find that the Globe and Mail, as usual, delivers a facile and misleading gloss on the historical background (and I quote):

"Narva has been on the front line, off and on, since the 15th century, when the Teutonic Knights built up a white-walled fortress on what is now the Estonian side of the river, and Ivan The Great marked the edge of Russian territory with a brown-walled castle just an arrow’s flight away in what is now the town of Ivangorod."

The following is closer to the truth:

"Narva has sat on the northern-most demarcation point of the long border between east and west european civilizations -- Orthodox and Catholic churches, Cyrillic and Latin alphabets, etc., etc. -- since April 5, 1242 when the ice of Lake Peipus some 50 kilometres to the south gave way under the heavily armoured Teutonic Knights and delivered to Alexander Nevsky one of the first and still most significant military victories in all of Russian history."

It is difficult to overstate the historical importance of that "Battle on the Ice" - It is as important to the Russians as the Battle of Hastings is to the British and arguably a foundational fact of modern day "Europe." The Narva frontier has been repeatedly overrun by armies and empires and political dominions, but the spiritual, cultural and civilizational border persists to this day.

:12 Mar 2015 09:24

Thanks for bringing this Fox News article into attention. What a painful reading. Since most war criminals are dead, Zuroff is looking for a job.

Fox News eats Putin's b.s.12 Mar 2015 09:06

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2...

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