Armed Forces
Russia Wants To Question Independence Of The Baltic States
Mobilna wyrzutnia pocisków przechwytujących AAD. Ilustracja: DRDO
Russian State Duma asked the Procurator General to examine the legality of independence of the Baltic republics, granted by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, back in 1991.
The Deputy Procurator General stated, in his interview for the Interfax Agency, that, legally speaking, the decision regarding approval of the independence of the Baltic states was faulty, since it was adopted by the non-constitutional bodies. In the eyes of the General Prosecutor’s office, the situation is similar to the one pertaining the Crimean Peninsula which was transferred to the Ukrainians by Nikita Khrushchev. This decision was also considered to be legally defective, since it was undertaken by the “non-constitutional” bodies.
However, even if in the infamous case of Crimea, the Russians found "a way to solve the problem", in case of the Baltic republics, the situation is way more complicated. Not only should one take the legal situation into account, but the political context should also be deeply scrutinized here.
The opinions that emerge in the media show that the Baltic states are the ones that are most prone to the potential Russian aggression. This is caused both by the potential threat of using the Russian minorities as a tool making it possible to create a conflict, as well as by the limited defensive potential which is currently at disposal of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. The Baltic states are expressly willing to increase the NATO’s military presence in the Mid-Eastern Europe.