Former leader of the Social Democrats and one of the authors of the Integration Monitor, Marju Lauristin, commented on DV how, from her point of view, it is necessary to solve the problem of the participation of local Russian citizens in the political life of Estonia.
The issue of possible deprivation of voting rights for citizens of Russia and Belarus in local elections is currently being resolved. What do you think about this?
In principle, I agree with the position of the Social Democrats that it is not worth doing this completely in the sense of solidarity. Among the citizens of the Russian Federation – I won’t say about Belarus, because there are very few of them, they are not represented by a separate group on issues, but the Russians are represented – especially among young people, about a third with their views and attitude towards the war, towards Ukraine, and towards other things in no way no different from Estonian citizens. They have completely pro-Estonian and pro-European views, they are ready to defend Estonia in case of war, etc. And in this sense, Lauri Läänemets is right when he says that we should not push away those who are with us. We need to find an approach that takes this difference into account.
As for the rest, indeed, among Russian citizens, as, unfortunately, among sulfur passport holders, there is a large part that, on the contrary, takes positions that in no way coincide with the position of the European Union or the Estonian state. They need to be dealt with differently. This is monitoring data and should be relied upon.
Does this mean that two thirds of Russian citizens are disloyal or not?
I wouldn’t say so. There is such a gray area – such people answer “I don’t know” or don’t want to answer, they have conflicting views. I would say that there are also about a third or a little more people with definitely pro-Russian views regarding the war in Ukraine.
That is, a third are for, a third are against, and the rest do not want to answer?
I would say somewhere between a third and a half.
Those. between a third and half are in favor of the war or for Putin?
Yes.
That’s quite a lot. What do you think should be done about this?
Quite a lot, really. We are talking about the right to vote in elections and about representing the citizens of a warring aggressive country who identify themselves with this position. In a situation of total war, they would have equal opportunities with citizens. At these local elections the local authorities are represented, and in the event of war in the border areas they will play a greater role than in normal times of peace. What if through her actions she really does not help Estonia, but vice versa?
Does this mean that Russian citizens should be deprived of the right to vote?
In this sense it is justified. We need to find a solution here. A declaration of loyalty is one way out; some countries have it. Maybe there are some other possibilities, I’m not a lawyer, I wouldn’t talk about this topic, but I think that here we still need to find a way that makes a distinction in terms of content, in terms of values. It is justified in an emergency situation.
What if this declaration of loyalty influences the outcome of the elections? That is, the authorities will decide who is given the right to vote and who is not, giving the opportunity to vote to those who are for you, and not giving those who are against?
No. This is exactly the formula we once used. After the restoration of independence, for the first decade or even longer, those who ran were also required to sign a declaration that they had not collaborated with the KGB during Soviet times. And indeed everyone did it. Me too. If they did not sign this declaration, they were deprived of the right to be nominated as candidates. This is also part of the right to vote.
Of course, we can say that no one checked this. But if you signed it and lied, then everyone who knew about it had the right to contact the election commission and say that this candidate does not correspond to what he declared.
In Integration Monitoring you came to the conclusion that loyalty or disloyalty to the Republic of Estonia does not depend at all on the color of the passport. Is this true or not?
According to statistics, this is true. But the issue of voting rights is still a legal issue, and it is legally impossible to distinguish between citizens.
How do you choose to ignore the mindset of this part of the population?
If you ask me simply as a person, I agree with those who believe that this problem is not the most important at present. A lot of energy is spent on it. On the other hand, I can understand those people for whom this problem is very important. This is a problem of trust, fairness and so on.
Could this step, if implemented, become a precedent? This is discrimination…
This is not discrimination. A person discriminates against himself if he has not become a citizen. Because of the war, we are now placed in a situation where things that would normally be in the background become more prominent. A person must decide for himself. In our survey there was a question about whether a person agrees that Russia’s aggression poses before every person who is associated with it by nationality the problem of choosing whether to be with Russia or with Estonia? And those people who spoke more pro-European, pro-Estonian on other issues also answered this question that this is a situation of choice when it needs to be made.
Dictatorships often begin with some kind of emergency. Can a precedent become a rule?
No. There is no such desire here. And I think, on the contrary, this situation should be resolved in such a way that half of those who have Russian citizenship, when asked what kind of citizenship they would like to have, would answer Estonian. Among them, by the way, the majority speak the language. They do not have Estonian citizenship due to indifference or it was more comfortable for them to have the opportunity to travel here and there and not decide. But in this new situation there is no such comfort anymore. Now it matters more that they find themselves in a situation where they are citizens of a country that openly says that it is at war not only with Ukraine, but with the entire West, including Estonia.
That is, do I understand correctly, what kind of option do you have with a declaration of loyalty?
Yes, I am for the option with a declaration of loyalty.
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Source: www.dv.ee
