Georgiy Boos made that suggestion during an interview posted on the information portal of the Latvian city of Daugavpils two weeks ago, and in the days since then, it has been featured on a variety of other news outlets both hard copy and electronic.
Despite the attention it has been given in the Russian media, there are compelling reasons for thinking that this idea will never be realized, but there are even more compelling ones for concluding that his proposal is intended as a clever political trap into which those in Estonia and Latvia, who might welcome a reduction in the number of "Russian speaking" non-citizens, could fall all too easily.
The reasons why this plan is unlikely to go anywhere are very, very clear. First of all, as an increasing number of Moscow officials now acknowledge, ethnic Russians in Estonia and Latvia generally live significantly better than their „compatriots” in the Russian Federation. Their incomes are higher, they are increasingly learning the national languages, and they are becoming citizens in ever greater numbers.
Second, Kaliningrad is not an attractive destination for anyone. Its residents suffer from some of the highest rates of HIV/AIDS infections in Europe. The exclave has an increasingly serious drug problem. And its physical environment is among most degraded and unhealthy of anywhere in the world. Indeed, many of those who live there now hope to leave – and generally to the West rather than to the Russian Federation proper.
And third, neither the Russian government nor anyone else has the kind of money that such a massive undertaking would require. Simply moving that many people would be extraordinarily expensive, and the authorities would have to oversee the creation of a large number of new jobs in a region already suffering from massive unemployment and the building of attractive housing and effective infrastructure in a place that generally lacks these features.
Consequently, those Boos has identified as candidates for such a move have very good reasons for staying where they are, few reasons for thinking that they would be better off in any way in Kaliningrad, and no reasons at all for concluding that the situation in the former German Koenigsberg is going to become more attractive to them at least any time soon.
But Boos, a senior Russian politician with close ties to President Vladimir Putin, certainly knows all that. Why then did he make this proposal, one that would seem doomed to failure and might even be expected to make him look ridiculous? Again, the reasons are obvious, and they are the only reason for considering this proposal seriously at all.
What Boos and those in Moscow who stand behind him are clearly hoping for is that some Estonian and Latvian nationalists will come out in support of Boos’ proposal because it would appear to lead to the diminution of the Russian presence in their countries, something they have long sought.
Such statements in turn will serve Moscow’s purposes even more than any movement of ethnic Russians from Estonia and Latvia might. On the one hand, this latest Russian invitation is likely to provoke new discussions in both countries about just where the "real" loyalties of ethnic Russians there, discussions that ought not be reopened because ethnic Russians have overwhelmingly shown that they are on the side of the countries in which they live. Indeed, that trend itself may explain why Moscow is again trying to provoke such discussions in order to destabilize Estonia and Latvia and isolate them from their allies.
And on the other hand, Russian representatives abroad could be counted on to trumpet these statements to the world as evidence of what Moscow has always insisted upon, that Estonia and Latvia as a whole want to „expel” Russians from those two countries and that the European Union must move quickly to discipline its new members in the name of a common European home and, not incidentally, the continuing free flow of Russian gas to Western Europe.
As Estonians know well, Moscow is even now seeking to use its influence in some countries of the European Union to get that institution to force Estonia and Latvia to sign border agreements whose contents and manner of ratification will meet Russia’s requirements or to make other concessions on language, for example, that Moscow would like to see.
Up to now, the Russian government has not been successful in that effort. And that is the reason behind Boos’ suggestions. Once that is understood, it is clear that the best possible reaction by Estonians and Latvians to his proposal is no reaction at all – or one limited to a careful diplomatic explanation to their European partners of just what Moscow is once again trying to do.