TALLINN - Two owners of Sillamae Port have announced their intentions to build a new bridge connecting Narva and Ivangorod if plans for a state-funded bridge are kept on the back burner due to increasing tension between Estonia and Russia. Tiit Vahi, a founder of the upstart Sillamae Port, and Andrei Katkov, a Russian businessman, told a conference in Narva last week that they are mulling over plans to erect a private bridge, since a bilaterally financed project has been frozen after Estonia's government announced its intention to remove a war grave and monument in the center of Tallinn, a move that has infuriated Russia.
"If we build a bridge as a private project, it will be a very simple economic solution, without any political problems," Vahi, a former Estonian prime minister, told The Baltic Times.
"This project began in 1987. Everything except the color of the bridge has been planned and is waiting in the offices of the transport ministry. The government process is too slow. If it had private initiative, we could already have the design and building rights."
Vahi said it was unfeasible to have heavy traffic running through the center of Narva. Forecasts showed that road freight between Russia and the EU would double within the next twenty years, and private initiative was now required to ensure Estonia could benefit from the trade, Vahi said.
"Finance is not a problem. Not only my company, but a lot of other companies are ready to finance it, on the Russian side also," he said.
The current two-lane bridge spanning Narva and Ivangorod cannot handle the rising traffic flows, and both Russia and Estonia have long recognized the need for a new one. However, Russian officials refused to show up at a recent intergovernmental meeting scheduled to discuss the new bridge project, which would cost some 35 million euros.
Economy Minister Edgar Savisaar previously commented that Russia's behavior was the first fallout over the Tonismagi war memorial.
Savisaar, who was also present at the conference 's titled "Development on the Estonian-Russian Border" 's said that trade volumes between the two countries was on the rise and that Estonia needed to position itself better to benefit from the booming Russian economy. Estonia, he stressed, needed the new Narva bridge in order to compete.
"If previously it was predominantly Russian raw materials that moved through Estonia to Europe, then now, when the Russian market is starting to open up, more consumer goods in containers are going from Europe to Russia," Savisaar told the conference.
Vahi, a former prime minister, said that Estonia was also in good position to benefit from increasing trade between the EU and China. "But even here we won't pass by Russia, since… the Estonian border doesn't meet the Chinese Wall," he said.
A new Narva bridge is particularly vital for the port in Sillamae, which since its opening in 2005 has made the claim of being the EU's easternmost port. It was created using private capital 's both Estonian and Russian 's and thus has large ambitions. But to realize its full potential Sillamae will need better land connections with Russia, whose border lies just 25 kilometers to the port's east.
Katkov told the conference that freight handling at the port is continually on the rise and that there are plans to build a container terminal in the near future. But for that to be successful, he said, Narva will need a new bridge.
Raivo Vare, an executive from Eesti Raudtee (Estonian Railways), reminded everyone that building a new bridge would not be easy. In his words, there are forces in St. Petersburg, which has the largest port in the Baltic Sea region, that are satisfied with the status quo. "Several influential people are not excited about the fact that everything is going well for Sillamae Port," he said.
Last year Sillamae Port handled 670,000 tons of cargo, of which 40 percent was fuel products. Notably, the port opened a passenger terminal last July, and now operates a regular route with Kotka, Finland.
The story of Sillamae almost defies belief. During the Soviet period it was a center of uranium production, and therefore closed to all outsiders. When Russian troops pulled out in 1994, they left behind 12 tons of radioactive sludge, which earned the town the unflattering nickname of "uranium lake."
Thanks to EU funds, the waste was cleaned up, sealed in a cement sarcophagus, and covered in soil. Later, investors revamped the old port and the town's railroad station, laid down new roads and pipelines for loading ships. Estonia suddenly had a new port.
But all the hard work will be for naught if bilateral relations continue in the current deep-freeze mode. Still, Vare said it was futile to wait around and hope that relations between Estonia and Russia improve.
"It's a matter of time. It will take at least five years to build a new bridge 's if we start now. And we need a new bridge now," he said.
Savisaar echoed the point, saying that the upcoming changes in the Riigikogu (Estonia's parliament) wouldn't alter the situation. "If anyone hopes that after March 4 [the day of parliamentary elections 's ed.] we can take the Bronze Soldier issue off the burner and that Russia's attitude will immediately change, then it won't happen that easily," he said.
Savisaar, who leads the ruling Center Party, has spoken against removal of the Bronze Soldier monument on Tonismagi. However, the Reformists, a coalition partner, and the right-wing union Pro Patria and Res Publica, have managed to gather enough votes to proceed with relocating the war grave on Tonismagi. Now they are targeting the nearby monument.
This has enraged Russia, where lawmakers have proposed hitting back with economic sanctions. But Estonian MPs supporting the monument's removal are unafraid of economic repercussions.
As Igor Grazin, an MP with the ruling Reform Party, told the Associated Press, "Russia's role in Estonia's economy is really insignificant 's less than 5 percent." That, he said, is enough. "Like other small states, we have overextended our transit potential. We don't want any more oil transit in Estonia 's we want to cut Russian transit in Estonia."
Savisaar warned against maintaining such an attitude. "I don't agree with those who say that Russian transit is not important for Estonia since it only accounts for 8 or 9 percent of GDP and benefits only transit businessmen," the minister said. "In reality Russian transit affects Estonia's economy in the largest sense of the word."
Not everyone agrees. As many politicians and analysts point out, Russia's saber-rattling will never go as far as sanctions since Russian capital is heavily invested in Estonia's transit business.
