Dear participants in the conference!


When the Estonian people approved their new constitution in the referendum of June 28, 1992, they voted for the building of an Estonian state based on the democratic principles adopted in Europe. It could not possibly be otherwise, for ever since the establishment of the Republic of Estonia in 1918 we had already been embraced by the fold of European states as a legal equal.

The pre-war Estonia proved successful in Europe in both its economy and culture. The secret deal between Stalin's Soviet Union and Hitler's Germany cut off Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania as well as several other Central European countries from Europe for over fifty years. Yet even in those times the yearning kept alive in the souls of the Estonian people for their own statehood and for the European culture and way of life germane to it. That expectation and yearning has now transmuted into a desire to become a full and equal member among the states of Europe once again, to feel free in the European family, to command the esteem and respect of others which only devolves upon a nation that is industrious, peace-loving, treasuring the principles of truth and justice. We want to live abiding by the principles which we used to value in the past and which are valued by the nations to the west of us.

Yet what is Europe, after all? Is it only what lies west of us, thus Western Europe? For decades, it was the European Community turned the European Union that defined Europe. The Council of Europe had a slightly broader reach than that, but still it was Western Europe holding a monopoly on the concept of Europeanness.

The revolutionary events that began in Eastern Europe in the late Eighties and led to the toppling of communist regimes, to the reunification of Germany as well as the restoration of the Baltic states, have expanded Europe, as long as the notion of Central Europe has also been restored. The geographic and cultural boundaries of Europe are once again beginning to fuse. Estonia has always been part of Europe geographically; the border of Europe as an integral economic and cultural area has always been drawn east of us, in spite of attempts to alter it.

So the dynamic developments of the last few years suggest that a static idea of Europe as a tiny West-European peninsula has become anachronistic. It is time to define the concept of Europe dynamically.

This is corroborated by the development of the European Union as the chief integrating organization of our continent - by its expansion further east and north to incorporate Austria, Finland, Norway and Sweden. It is a logical, natural process, and it is clearly in Estonia's interest as well. The developmental principles of the reestablished Republic of Estonia have included openness and cooperation. A small country, such as Estonia, would be unable to exist in a closed system, only relying on its own possibilities. Openness to Europe and cooperation with Europe are what we crave as guarantees of our sovereignty and, through economic cooperation, also of our security: they will permit us to get access to European markets, enable us to get on our legs early in the economy and thereby to attain, also, new qualities in our education, culture and standard of living.

It is natural that entering into the European Union entails the need to give more consideration to the interests of other member states. But as the recent Finnish referendum to join the European Union has shown, for all that the eventual decision was yes, in favour of the European Union.

Broadening the European Union, which has stayed in its present boundaries for a long time, is also in the Union's own interest. The strive to make up for falling behind the times, the hungriness for development and inevitable change, the leanness and meanness, the energy and willingness to work, the passions of Central Europe will bring new energy to the core-EU, otherwise known as Western Europe. Widened membership will bring freshness of thinking, will bring innovation to the established ways of the Union.

Today, neither Estonia nor the European Union are ready for Estonia's immediate membership. We still need to fix one or two things in order to be a member-in-good-standing of the Union. However, we have done and will do everything to make this period of growth as short as possible. In this respect we can only hail the striving of the Government of the Republic for a Europe Agreement by the end of this year as the necessary step toward eventual full membership.

The Europe Agreement will signal the European Union's acknowledgement of Estonia as a reliable partner. It will be another sign of the Union's acknowledgement of the fact that Europe is expanding dynamically, that European structures are changing.

May I remind you of a paradox by a great European, Norbert Wiener: only such structures persist unchanged that are in constant change. Europe is not Wonderland, but it can be Alice. Europe need not know it yet, whereas Estonia already knows it for sure.

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