The Weekly Crier
Archives
News highlights from Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.

News Highlights from May 1999

• If you haven't had enough of Monica Lewinsky in English, you can now hear her tell of her assorted trials and tribulations in Latvian. The Riga-based Artava publisher recently released the Latvian-language version of Lewinsky's memoirs, Monica's Story. Publishers said many Latvians were unable to read the English-language original, and that its price was also too high-about 35 dollars, or one week's salary for some Latvians; the Latvian book will cost around 10 dollars. In 1998, the Lewinsky scandal was one of the top news stories in the Baltic states; one recent survey in Estonia indicated that, after Boris Yeltsin, Lewinsky was the second most recognizable foreign celebrity among Estonian school children.

• Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus, who returned to Lithuania to become president in 1998 after 50 years in the United States, has managed to sell his house in Chicago. The Chicago Tribune said the house in the Hinsdale suburb sold for 695,000 dollars. Adamkus, who was a top official in the U.S. Environmental Agency until he retired in 1996, receives a yearly pension from the American government of some 60,000 dollars. His yearly salary as Lithuanian president is 35,000 dollars-all of which he donates to charity.

• Russia says it has reduced the number of troops on its northwest flank—near the Baltic states—by almost 50 percent in recent years. Moscow said in May that the reductions also included the closure of military sites and drastic cuts in personnel. Russian Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev said the reductions proved Russia "poses no threats to its neighbors." Baltic officials reacted cautiously; Russian troops in the region still vastly outnumber Baltic forces and Russia's arsenal along Baltic borders is still formidable. Observers say the troop cuts have been motivated mainly by Moscow's need to cut overall military costs.

• Latvia has accepted apologies from Czech President Vaclav Havel after an incorrectly proportioned Latvian flag was unfurled at welcoming ceremonies for visiting Latvian President Guntis Ulmanis. Latvia's flag is a maroon color with a narrow white stripe through the middle; the flag used by the Czechs had an off-maroon color with a very thick white stripe. Latvian officials said the May incident in Prague wasn't the first time a host country got their flag wrong, saying it would take time before the Latvian flag became better known across Europe. In the 1992 Olympics, at award ceremonies for an Estonian gold medalist, the blue, black and white Estonian flag was raised to the Estonian national anthem upside down.

• Estonian President Lennart Meri has blasted business leaders for failing to develop quality domestic industries, which he said was key to Estonia thriving in a global economy. He said Estonia's economic success had so far been based on foreign investment of over a billion dollars since 1991. "But domestic production in Estonia is in a deplorable state," he told a Tallinn business forum. "Without foreign investment, we would be looking at a very different economic picture."
         He chided businessmen for not taking the initiative themselves: "You've put me in an amusing and embarrassing situation, where the head of state has to remind businessmen of an almost biblical truth: that it's your task to create products that satisfy people's needs, and to sell them."
         Meri said businessmen should do more to kick-start high-tech industries in the areas of gene technology or telecommunications. He said Estonia should take its cue from Nokia, Finland's powerful telecommunications firm. "With great persistence, I've kept asking, 'What is the Estonian Nokia?'…But the president is not supposed to seek the Estonian Nokia. I am seeking it for you, for your lazy minds. Every Estonian proprietor must seek it for himself, must seek at least six Nokias a year."
         In the May 5 speech, Meri said lower taxes and a greater emphasis on education were keys to building quality industries. He also said Estonia was too small to sustain domestic industries, and that Estonia's priority export markets were countries around the Baltic Sea rim, and their 80 million consumers. In the long term, he said exporters should target other European countries and the United States.

• Baltic tempers have flared over pork, with thousands of Latvian farmers recently blocking border crossing with neighboring Estonia and Lithuania to protest a flood of agricultural imports. They said a 70 percent import tariff on pork, approved by parliament in May, wasn't good enough; they called for more wide-ranging protectionist measures, including tariffs on dairy products.
         During the May 28 action, traffic was backed up for kilometers at some border posts, with farmers using tractors to block roads. Some held placards denouncing the government's agricultural policies. One protestor released a pig wearing a crown, with the name of the Latvian prime minister's wife painted on its rump.
         Latvian farmers were hit hard by the collapse of the Russian market, which was their main export market. Imports have lately cornered nearly 90 percent of the Latvian pork market. Farmers have long complained the pro-market Latvian government neglects domestic producers, and is too focused on liberalizing trade.
         Estonia and Lithuania denounced the new Latvian tariffs, saying they violated free-trade treaties. All three nations have said their aim is a workable Baltic common market, but opposition from special interests and delays in coordinating laws have slowed the process.

• Estonia has the highest number of mobile phone users per capita in the former Communist bloc, or one out of every five Estonians, the Äripäev business daily reported. The number of mobile-phone users in Estonia (pop. 1.5 million) has soared from just 155 in 1991 to 284,000 in 1999. Estonia's per capita mobile-phone use is on par with many Western countries, including France and Germany. The Wall Street Journal recently reported that 30 percent of Tallinn residents have mobile phones-compared to 15 percent of residents in Warsaw and Moscow. Falling cell-phone costs and rising salaries have underpinned the mobile explosion. Since 1992, average wages have risen from some 35 to 250 dollars a month. Simultaneously, prices of mobile phones have plummeted from nearly 1000 dollars to just 60 dollars for special package deals. Competition between two or three mobile-phone services has also helped bring costs down.

• Who said nice guys finish last? When he returned from 50 years of exile in the United States to win the Lithuanian presidential election in 1998, skeptics said the kindly, soft-spoken Valdas Adamkus was not nearly tough enough for the job and that other politicians would surely eat him alive; he was, and they didn't.
         After a protracted public feud with then-Prime Minister Gediminas Vagnorius, it was Vagnorius who eventually stepped down, conceding that the overwhelming popularity of Adamkus had forced his hand.
         Adamkus had accused Vagnorius of being too arrogant, too heavy-handed and too non-communicative to lead the Lithuanian government. Vagnorius-a key figure in Lithuanian politics dating back to the independence drive from Moscow-shot back that Adamkus was overstepping his limited powers as president.
         But when the dust settled after months of personal acrimony between the two men, only the 72-year-old Adamkus was left standing. In May, Vagnorius was replaced by the popular mayor of Vilnius Rolandas Paksas, who, like Vagnorius, is a member of the center-right Conservative Party.
         After the months of political uncertainty, the president emerged as the big winner. His opinion poll ratings have soared to nearly 90 percent-a Baltic-wide record. Lithuanians say they have been impressed, not so much with their ex-pat American president's decisiveness, but with his appeal for more honesty and plain decency in government.
         Some said the president's success in collapsing the government-however well it ended up-set a bad precedent. Constitutionally, the president is supposed to have limited powers; the major responsibilities for running the country are vested in parliament. Adamkus may be a benevolent leader, but, said some observers, a less-well-intentioned president could some day abuse the power that Adamkus has shown a popular presidency can wield.
         Another clear winner in the Lithuanian political shakeup is the new prime minister, Rolandas Paksas. He is a newcomer to national politics, but won wide acclaim as Vilnius mayor by helping to revive the city's Medieval old quarter. He has said that he will stay at the reform course set by his Conservative Party predecessor.
         The handsome, easy-going 42-year-old has already seen his popularity skyrocket, and many peg him as the new golden boy of Lithuanian politics. He may also be key in reviving Conservative Party fortunes; until Paksas, the party had been stuck with unpopular leaders-like Gediminas Vagnorius and Vytautas Landsbergis-who appeared to become more unpopular by the day. Paksas could carry the party to victory in parliamentary elections next year. Others are already putting money on Paksas to become the next Lithuanian president.
         The government-crisis bug also bit in Latvia. But, unlike in Lithuania, clear winners and losers were more difficult to find.
         In mid-May, Latvian Prime Minister Vilis Kristopans fired his 29-year-old economics minister, Ainars Slesers, saying he had failed to efficiently implement government policy. The prime minister pointed specifically to the slow pace of privatizing a handful of big state enterprises still in government hands.
         The dismissal threatened to bring down the entire government, with Slesers' New Party warning that it could withdraw from the country's three-party coalition. After weeks of deliberations, however, the New Party said it would stay put; it said it didn't want to jeopardize Latvian development by destabilizing the government.
         Slesers was replaced by another New Party member, Ingrida Udre-at least temporarily patching the center, center-right coalition back together.
         The opposition People's Party managed to propose a vote of no-confidence, but, with the New Party having declared its loyalty to the government at the last minute, the motion mustered just 24 votes in the 100-seat legislature.
         The sacking of the economics minister also succeeded in bringing to the surface underlying tensions between powerful interest groups in Latvia-namely, between the country's domestic producers and the transit-trade sector.
         The outgoing economics minister accused Prime Minister Kristopans of being in the pocket of the oil-transit sector, which is led by Ventspils mayor and port authority chairman Aivars Lembergs.
         Opposition leader Andris Skele, who is said to represent the country's big producers, also lined up to lambast Lembergs. He said pressure from the oil-transit sector had led the government to neglect producers. Skele has said domestic industries need more government money to develop; he says domestic markets should also be better protected by the government from cheap imports.
         Most Latvians took the government shakeup in stride. There have been more than half-a-dozen Latvian governments in the eight years since independence, and at least as many major government shakeups. For most Latvians, as for most foreign investors, political bickering, backstabbing and seemingly illogical party alliances is situation normal.