Estonian intelligence: Russia plotting info attacks for Baltic centennials

“In 2018, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania will mark the centenaries of their independence. The Kremlin’s messages on this occasion are disseminated by history propagandists and pseudo-think tanks trying to tarnish and diminish these events,” EFIS said in its annual report titled “International Security and Estonia 2018” which was published on Thursday.

According to the report, “one of the first signs of the information influence campaign planned for 2018 was a conference held on Oct. 24 2017 in St. Petersburg, ‘Wars and revolutions in 1917-1920: Birth of Finnish, Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian statehood’. The organizers were the Russian Baltic Studies Association coordinated by the Presidential Administration and an even more ambitious tool of the Kremlin, the Alexander Gorchakov Public Diplomacy Fund.”

The Estonian authorities said “Russia also actively seeks historians from the Baltic states who would be prepared to legitimize, by their participation, the Kremlin’s propaganda aimed at Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.”

“It is clear that Russia does not seek a genuine dialogue or discussions, that is establishment of a platform for academic relations. Rather, it tries to simply exploit representatives of the imaginary adversary,” reads the report.

Lithuania will celebrate a 100-year anniversary of restored statehood on Feb. 16.