Pronksöö (The Bronze Night)

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The Bronze Night (Estonian: Pronksiöö), also known as the April Unrest and April Events refer to the riots and controversy surrounding the 2007 relocation of the Bronze Soldier of Tallinn, the Soviet World War II memorial in Tallinn, Estonia.
Many Estonians considered the Bronze Soldier in the city centre a symbol of Soviet occupation and repression. At the same time the monument has significant symbolic value to Estonia’s community of mostly ethnic Russian post-World War II immigrants, symbolising not only Soviet victory over Nazi Germany in the Great Patriotic War, but also their claim to rights in Estonia.
Amid political controversy, in April 2007 the Government of Estonia started final preparations for the reburial of the remains and relocation of the statue, according to the political mandate received from the last elections (held in March 2007). Disagreement over the appropriateness of the action led to mass protests and riots (accompanied by looting), lasting for two nights, the worst Estonia has seen since the Soviet reoccupation in 1944, which included the still unsolved murder of one Russian. In the early morning hours of April 27, 2007, after the first night’s rioting, the Government of Estonia decided, at an emergency meeting, to relocate the monument immediately, referring to security concerns. By the following afternoon the stone structure had been dismantled as well. As of the afternoon of April 30, the statue without the stone structure had been placed at the Cemetery of the Estonian Defence Forces in Tallinn. An opening ceremony for the relocated statue was held on May 8, VE Day. (Soviet Army veterans celebrate Victory Day a day later, on May 9.) During June 2007 the stone structure was rebuilt. Relatives have made claims to bodies of four of the war dead. Unclaimed remains were reburied at the military cemetery, next to the relocated monument, on July 3, 2007

Sinimäed (Blue Hills)

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This Second World War documentary tells the story of the conscription of Estonian volunteers by the German Army for the Eastern Front. As the German Army retreated westwards in 1944, the Estonian volunteers returned to defend their homeland from the advancing Soviet Red Army who were not seen as liberators but instead brought back memories of the oppressive 1940 Stalinist occupation that had resulted from the Molotov/Ribbentrop Pact. A war diary written by Estonian Captain Paul Maitla is used as the primary source material. There are also present day interviews with soldiers who took part in the war including Estonians, Germans and Russians as well as present day reminiscences by Paul Maitla’s daughter. The last stand of the Estonian Army in the region known as the Blue Hills (Sinimäed in Estonian) in Estonia, allowed 80,000 Estonian refugees sufficient time to escape to the West and to avoid the resulting Soviet occupation.

Alyosha

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Most monuments erected during the Soviet regime were taken away after Estonia regained its independence in 1991. The Bronze Soldier Alyosha, located in the centre of Tallinn, remained in its place. For Estonian nationalists this monument was the symbol for Soviet occupation and marked the beginning of Stalinist repressions. However, for many Russians the monument was one of the few remaning symbols that connected them to Russia and Russian identity.

Documentary Alyosha brings us the people who gathered to the Bronze Soldier in 2005-2007 and whose behaviour created a new line in our cultural memory. What mattered were the rituals around the monument, not the monument itself. Differences of opinion about history resulted in tragic conflicts and relocating the monument.