TALLINN - Fresh evidence of the growing antagonism between the majority ethnic Estonian and minority Russian groups was revealed this week when official sources claimed stateless residents prefer Russian citizenship to Estonian citizenship in increasing numbers.
Urve Palo, the minister for population, told the Estonian public television station ETV that the number of people applying for Estonian citizenship has declined this year. The Russian Embassy in stark contrast claims that the number of people applying for Russian citizenship has gone up.
In the first two months of 2008 the number of applicants for Estonian citizenship was only 332 's almost half the figure for the same time period in 2007.
Palo shrugged off the trend towards less people wanting to become Estonian.
"If a person feels that he wishes to have the citizenship of the Russian Federation, what can one do," he said.
Russian Consul Alexander Marmayev told ETV that minority groups had lost confidence in democracy in Estonia after the events of last April when rioters took to the streets over the government's removal of a Communist statue.
About 147, 000 people have sought citizenship of Russia over the past 16 years and about the same number have become Estonian citizens.
Not all Russians living in Estonia are unhappy with their lives here.
"I can't complain about living in Estonia as a Russian. Some things make me sad when I see media describing things that make me sad. But for me it is good living here and no one has insulted me because I speak Russian, happily. Perhaps I'm just lucky," said Jaana Kalinistova, a Russian Estonian.
There were, however, dissenting voices.
"I don't plan on becoming an Estonian citizen, the authorities here have no respect for us and in any case I have the same rights of travel with a Russian passport in Latvia. Also, it's easier if I want to visit relatives in Russia," said a Russian speaker who has lived in Estonia all his life and who didn't wish to be named.
The ministry of population has no plans to make it easier for stateless people to become citizens. It announced a new integration program in March but it has no plans to increase the number of people who can become citizens.
Under the previous integration program, which ran from 2000 to 2007, only 5,000 people a year became Estonian citizens.
The ministry hopes to assimilate children at a very young age. Population ministry adviser Eva-Maria Asari said the goal of the integration program was to have 80 per cent of non-ethnic Estonians studying in Estonian kindergartens by 2010.
At the moment in order to become a citizen it is necessary to pass stringent Estonian language exams. The Estonian language is notoriously one of the most difficult languages in the world with over 14 case endings.
According to government figures in 2005 only 22 percent of non-Estonians described their knowledge of the language as good, whereas 54 percent of non-Estonians spoke it badly or not at all.
