Kaja Kallas, Estonia’s prime minister and a leader of the EU’s anti-Kremlin bloc, has said that she will not resign after coming under pressure over her husband’s business ties to Russia.
Ms Kallas, 46, has faced calls to step down after it was reported that her husband owned a 25 per cent stake in Stark Logistics, an Estonian company that has been supplying an aerosol container factory in Russia.
At least two major Estonian newspapers have now called for Ms Kallas to stand down and opinion polls have shown that most Estonians also want her to quit, even though she has insisted that her husband, Arvo Hallik, has done nothing illegal.
“There must be punishments for dealing with sanctioned goods but everything else is a matter of moral compass,” Ms Kallas told ERR, Estonia’s public broadcaster, on Friday evening. “I have no plans to resign.”
In May, Ms Kallas won a second term in office after campaigning heavily on her anti-Kremlin credentials.
Moscow ruled Estonia and its two Baltic neighbours, Lithuania and Latvia, from after the Second World War until they broke away from the Soviet Union in 1991. Since then the Baltic states have joined both Nato and the EU and are staunch supporters of Ukraine, although they share borders with Russia and Belarus.
Don’t step down, that won’t solve anything, STOP the supply.
The missing context being that its her husbands business partner that has those ties. When one is working a job thats effectively 24/7, AND have kids, you really think she gonna have time and energy to also pay attention to what his husbands business partners do?
Sounds quite typical for Estonian practice. I used to work for an Estonian startup and noticed my colleagues speaking passionately against the Russians but at the same time facilitating sanctions evasion by using their ties to create trade back-doors.
I talked to a few other people who all came up with this perplexing conclusion that Estonians are proud of their singing revolution which gained them independence, scared shitless of Russia as a neighbor but very quick to exploit existing knowledge of- and access to- the Russian market also utilizing the large group of ethnic Russians in the country to the fullest to devise market schemes.
I never understood this situation at all but any attempt to put it on the table as a discussion point was always immediately buried by the CEO and COO with things like “*oh, we know they are a Russian company but it is OK to deal with their Hamburg office because it is a separate entity*” or similar transparent argumentation.
Rules for thee but not for me.
As far as I’m concerned he has ties with businesses that are NOT sanctioned. So what’s the problem here?
What are those “Russian ties” again?
On the end of the day – it is always about the money…
8 comments
**From The Telegraph’s James Kilner:**
Kaja Kallas, Estonia’s prime minister and a leader of the EU’s anti-Kremlin bloc, has said that she will not resign after coming under pressure over her husband’s business ties to Russia.
Ms Kallas, 46, has faced calls to step down after it was reported that her husband owned a 25 per cent stake in Stark Logistics, an Estonian company that has been supplying an aerosol container factory in Russia.
At least two major Estonian newspapers have now called for Ms Kallas to stand down and opinion polls have shown that most Estonians also want her to quit, even though she has insisted that her husband, Arvo Hallik, has done nothing illegal.
“There must be punishments for dealing with sanctioned goods but everything else is a matter of moral compass,” Ms Kallas told ERR, Estonia’s public broadcaster, on Friday evening. “I have no plans to resign.”
In May, Ms Kallas won a second term in office after campaigning heavily on her anti-Kremlin credentials.
Moscow ruled Estonia and its two Baltic neighbours, Lithuania and Latvia, from after the Second World War until they broke away from the Soviet Union in 1991. Since then the Baltic states have joined both Nato and the EU and are staunch supporters of Ukraine, although they share borders with Russia and Belarus.
**Read more ⤵️**
[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/08/26/estonias-kaja-kallas-refuses-resign-husbands-russia-ties/](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/08/26/estonias-kaja-kallas-refuses-resign-husbands-russia-ties/)
Don’t step down, that won’t solve anything, STOP the supply.
The missing context being that its her husbands business partner that has those ties. When one is working a job thats effectively 24/7, AND have kids, you really think she gonna have time and energy to also pay attention to what his husbands business partners do?
Sounds quite typical for Estonian practice. I used to work for an Estonian startup and noticed my colleagues speaking passionately against the Russians but at the same time facilitating sanctions evasion by using their ties to create trade back-doors.
I talked to a few other people who all came up with this perplexing conclusion that Estonians are proud of their singing revolution which gained them independence, scared shitless of Russia as a neighbor but very quick to exploit existing knowledge of- and access to- the Russian market also utilizing the large group of ethnic Russians in the country to the fullest to devise market schemes.
I never understood this situation at all but any attempt to put it on the table as a discussion point was always immediately buried by the CEO and COO with things like “*oh, we know they are a Russian company but it is OK to deal with their Hamburg office because it is a separate entity*” or similar transparent argumentation.
Rules for thee but not for me.
As far as I’m concerned he has ties with businesses that are NOT sanctioned. So what’s the problem here?
What are those “Russian ties” again?
On the end of the day – it is always about the money…