“Estonian government can guarantee, that nobody would be honoured in Estonia for fighting in nazi uniform or belonging to Waffen-SS”, a government spokesperson told Euractiv.
Last December, the Delfi news website in Estonia reported that the Defence Ministry wants Parliament to consider a bill that would recognise World War II fighters against Soviet troops as Estonian freedom fighters. Attempts to pass such legislation failed in 2006 and in 2010.
Various media, including the UK Daily Mail and Germany’s Tageszeitung, carried this information.
"To cover crimes, committed by Estonian Nazi collaborators, to call their activities "a struggle for national liberation", to justify and glorify them trough law is blasphemous and unacceptable," the Russian Embassy in Tallinn said in a statement.
In fact, such a draft does not exist, there is only a plan according to the coalition agreement of the Government to prepare a draft resolution to recognise people who have fought to restore the independence of Estonia, government sources from Tallinn told EurActiv.
Estonia’s Ministry of Defence stresses that neither the Ministry nor the government of Estonia "have drawn up nor will draw up a bill that would label somebody a freedom fighter based on the uniform he wore".
"It is true that the Government of the Republic has, in its work schedule, given the Ministry of Defence the assignment of preparing a draft resolution to recognise people who have fought to restore the independence of Estonia," the Ministry writes further.
“The fight against Nazi and Soviet totalitarian regimes was also a part of the Estonian fight for freedom and the decision of the government to honour the struggle for the restoration of Estonian independence is a natural and unequivocal choice,” the Ministry states.
A number of EU member states of the European Union such as the Czech Republic have approved similar bills to honour their resistance fighters, Tallinn argues further.
The exact wording of the bill is expected to be drafted by spring of this year.
COMMENTS
The proposed legislation in Estonia to honour freedom fighters in WWII may run against its soft obligations as a new EU member state to confront and remember its past. It´s one thing to honour people who really fought for freedom and independence - a totally other thing to honour collaborators with the Nazi occupation who enrolled and fought in Waffen SS and who might have committed war crimes.
I am so happy to hear that Estonia is attempting to honor those who fought against communism and the Soviet Union. Russia continues to turn a blind eye to the fact that Stalin was every bit the murderer as Hitler. It is time to honor those Estonians who did not compromise with the Soviets, and who fought for the freedom of their nation during WWII.
Russia can't have it both ways. Either admit Stalin was a war criminal and intent and forcing his repressive worldview and communist ideology into as many places as possible . Or he was not.
In any case Estonia was well within its rights to protect its society from invasion.
These men who joined the Waffen SS in 1944 were conscripted by the Germans, and the Nuremburg trials explicitly exempted conscripts from their final judgement. These conscripts fought entirely on the territory of their homeland Estonia in defensive battles at a time when the Germans were clearly losing the war. Given collaborationism is defined as the act of cooperating traitorously with an enemy that is occupying one's country, to whom exactly were these soldiers being traitorous to when they tried to stop the Soviets from re-occupying Estonia?
If those who fought for the SS where only fighting because of enforced conscription then they weren't anybodies heroes. And if they weren't conscripted but freely joined they were heroes of the SS. personally the only thing I take from these constant attempts to revise the status of SS soldiers is that Estonia is a good place to be from not in.
I don't know what status is being revised here. Sixty years ago, just five years after the end of WW2, the Allied High Commission (which administered allied occupied Germany) composed of Britain, France and the United states determined that these Baltic Waffen SS Units were not to be seen as "volunteer" or "SS" as they had not been given the training, indoctrination, and induction normally given to regular Waffen SS members. The US Displaced Persons Commission subsequently declared in September 1950 that the Baltic Waffen SS Units are to be considered as separate and distinct in purpose, ideology, activities, and qualifications for membership from the German SS, and therefore the Commission held them not to be "a movement hostile to the Government of the United States". It seems to me that in 2012, over sixty years later, it is in fact the Russian foreign ministry is the one attempting to change the status of these conscripts.
I have a suspicion that the real aim of this bill is to honour the "Forest Brothers" and the (underground) dissident movement throughout the occupation period. Perhaps also the Finnish Boys - Estonians who ran across the border to Finland in order to fight against Stalin without being drafted to the German army.
it comes as no surprise, however, that yet again, Russia has Godwined the argument (because obviously, if you're not for Stalin, then you must be for Hitler... obviously). I am surprised though that they haven't yet suggested to commit the entire government of Estonia to a mental institution and administer electric shock therapy, which works wonders with the "criminally insane anti-communist elements".
To me this just once again confirms the historical pitfalls of being a small nation: the bigger fish are always out there to eat you up. While I can fathom Russian ignorance to actually believe Estonia "willingly" joined the USSR -- hence justifying it's subsequent incorporation and occupation -- what I cannot fathom is who in their right might would consider that ANY nation would submit to another nation or power without resistance -- let alone do so willingly? Increasingly I have begun to question the media outlets that continue to subscribe to this rubbish the Russian Foreign Ministry and others continue to peddle along with those who spread it...
Russia illegally annexed Estonia and created the Estonian SSR. Now that Estonia is finally finding its own identity again, Russia steps in. I have nothing against Russia as a nation, but let Estonia honour those people who tried to protect it. The 'forrest brothers' who fought against the Soviet Union deserve recognition.
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