Estonia's prime minister on Russia's wanted list: Kaja Kallas has done it

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Kaja Kallas in Tallinn in January

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Peter Kollanyi/Bloomberg/Getty Images

An award. Like a medal for the constant fight against the Kremlin's propaganda in the Ukrainian War. This is one interpretation of the inclusion of Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas on a Russian wanted list.

Kallas was not mistaken about Vladimir Putin. She has been Prime Minister of the Baltic state since 2021. And actually she warned from the beginning. As early as January 2022, before the Russian invasion of Ukraine, she arranged for her country to deliver weapons to Kiev. The fact that she is a target of the Kremlin should come as a surprise to few people, least of all to herself. And the rather symbolic step from Moscow is unlikely to really affect her unless she is traveling to Russia or a country close to Russia. But who is Kaja Kallas?

The former MEP and daughter of the former Estonian prime minister and EU deputy commissioner Siim Kallas, a central figure in the Estonian independence movement, knows Russian imperialism from her family history.

In March 2022, two weeks after the Russian attack, some people in Europe were still discussing whether one or two economic connections to Russia could still be maintained. Kallas, on the other hand, stood in front of the EU Parliament and talked about her mother, grandmother and great-grandmother. At the end of the 1940s they were deported to the “cold country” by Soviet soldiers and suffered from hunger, cold and fear. Kallas warned that the war would not end quickly and that Europe had to stand together.

And she repeatedly attacked Vladimir Putin and demanded early on that he should be tried for war crimes. In an interview with SPIEGEL, she said that there was no point in speaking to the Kremlin leader. »He is a war criminal. If you look at the definition of war crimes or genocide, he clearly committed such crimes. Why should you talk to him?” Instead of talking to him, Kallas talks about Putin and his war. She has declared war on war weariness.

»E-Estonia« and its historical responsibility

The Estonians show solidarity with Ukraine, this is evident from their country's history. Estonia celebrates its independence every year on February 24th, the day of the Russian invasion. The Republic of Estonia was proclaimed in 1918 before continuing to exist as a Soviet republic from 1940. Estonia regained its independence in 1991 and joined the European Union and NATO in 2004. Today, the small Baltic state is considered a pioneer when it comes to digitalization; there is talk of “E-Estonia”.

Kaja Kallas has become the face of this emerging state. As a young politician, she built up many contacts in Brussels, for which she was once ridiculed by the Estonian media, but which now help her and, above all, her country. She cares about not being forgotten. »When the Iron Curtain fell, France and Germany didn't miss us. But we, we missed you. We missed freedom,” she told SPIEGEL last year. "We have to be useful, we have to show that we are needed."

Counter-proposal to Putin's Russia

The 46-year-old says things like "we women have to work twice as hard" or explains that as prime minister she only bought pants because they were more practical when climbing tanks while visiting troops. The strong and liberal Kallas fits into the zeitgeist, or rather: into the zeitgeist of the West. It almost seems logical that Kallas is perceived as an enemy in the Kremlin. As a personified alternative to Vladimir Putin's Russia, it stands for a country that has broken away from the former occupying power.

In Moscow it has been criminalized as a "falsification of history" to speak of Russian occupation of the Soviet republics; they see themselves as "liberators" of the Baltic states of Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia.

However, these supposedly liberated states had Soviet war memorials torn down. That's why, in addition to Kallas, the Lithuanian Culture Minister Siomnas Kairys and the mayor of the Lithuanian city of Klaipeda, Arvydas Vaitkus, are also on the wanted list as the first foreign head of government. "The political assessment is, of course, that it is a kind of award for people who support Ukraine and support the fight of good against evil," said Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis to the BNS agency.

Kallas himself spoke briefly on Tuesday. The fact that she is on a Russian wanted list will not silence her; she will continue her strong support for Ukraine. The fact remains: no surprise in Tallinn.

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