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The Russian Federation assumed the burden and the subsequent withdrawal of the occupation force, consisting of about 150,000 former Soviet, now Russian, troops stationed in the Baltic states. [77] In 1992 there were still 120,000 Russian troops there, [78] as well as a large number of military pensioners, particularly in Estonia and Latvia.
Russians in the Baltic states is a broadly defined subgroup of the Russian diaspora who self-identify as ethnic Russians, or are citizens of Russia, and live in one of the three independent countries — Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania — primarily the consequences of the USSR's forced population transfers during occupation.
By 1920, German troops had withdrawn and the Russian Civil War was in its final phase. Consequently, the Baltic states signed peace treaties with Soviet Russia. Estonia signed the Treaty of Tartu on 2 February, Lithuania signed the Soviet–Lithuanian Peace Treaty on 12 July and Latvia signed the Latvian–Soviet Peace Treaty on 15 August 1920. [3]
The Soviet Union recognised the Baltic independence on 6 September 1991. The Russian troops stayed for an additional three years, as Boris Yeltsin linked the issue of Russian minorities with troop withdrawals. Lithuania was the first to have the Russian troops withdrawn from its territory in August 1993.
Territorial changes of the Baltic states refers to the redrawing of borders of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia after 1940. The three republics, formerly autonomous regions within the former Russian Empire and before that of former Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and as provinces of the Swedish Empire, gained independence in the aftermath of World War I and the Russian Revolution of 1917.
Yahoo News has obtained confidential strategy documents drawn up by the Kremlin that reveal Russia’s ambitious plans to exert its influence in the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
Most other Western countries maintain similar position until restoration of Baltic states' sovereignty in 1991. 30 July 1940, The president of Estonia, Konstantin Päts, is imprisoned by NKVD and deported to Russia where he dies in the mental hospital of Kalinin on 18 January 1956. 3 August 1940 Soviet Union annexes Lithuania.
"Because of the openly hostile line of Vilnius, Riga and Tallinn, all interstate, interdepartmental, regional and sectoral ties with Russia have been severed," Maria Zakharova, the spokeswoman of ...