The Estonian Evangelical Lutheran Church (EELK) will temporarily suspend marriage registrations as of 1 January 2024, Postimees reports. Archbishop Urmas Viilma said that the decision was due to “practical reasons.” He noted that the church’s questions on what legislative amendments that legalised same-sex marriages meant in practice remained unanswered. He pointed out that members of…
The chairman of the Estonian Centre Party (Keskerakond), Jüri Ratas, announced that he would not seek reelection, ERR reports. Ratas has been chairman of the opposition party since 2016. The party’s deputy chairman, Tallinn mayor Mihhail Kõlvart, said that he was ready to run for the post of chairman. Meanwhile, several senior members of the…
The Estonian Centre Party (Keskerakond) has a rift in its leadership, party chairman Jüri Ratas stated, BNS reports. Earlier, the party’s governing board voted to return a donation of EUR 300,000 from local businessman Parvel Pruunsild. Ratas had insisted that the donation would have helped the party finance its operations. However, the party’s deputy chairman,…
Estonia’s state-owned company Rail Baltic Estonia, which was established to build the Rail Baltica railway, reported revenue of nearly EUR 39.6mn in 2022, which was up 84.3% from 2021, BNS reports. The company’s annual profit more than doubled from EUR 11.4mn to EUR 28.5mn. Rail Baltic Estonia made a profit of EUR 36mn from targeted…
Estonia’s daily newspapers, Eesti Päevaleht and Postimees, strongly criticised in their editorials on 5 July 2023 the Consumer Protection and Technical Regulatory Authority’s (TTJA) proposed legislation to monitor the truthfulness, impartiality, and balance of news programmes, ERR reports. Both editorials strongly rejected the notion of state intervention in media, emphasising the importance of media freedom…
Only 56% of legal entities in Estonia managed to submit their annual reports on time by the 30 June 2023 deadline, according to the Ministry of Justice, BNS reports. Out of approximately 290,000 entities obligated to report, which make up about 95% of all legal entities, altogether 162,689 submitted their reports on time. Margit Veskimäe,…
For the first time since the restoration of independence, the number of prisoners in Estonia has dropped below 2,000, BNS reports. There are now a total of 1,994 prisoners in Estonian prisons, with 202 of them serving sentences in open prisons. The number of offenders under the supervision of probation officers on a daily basis…
Following the imposition of sanctions on Russian timber, Estonia has seen a surge in heavy timber imports from unexpected countries, where forests are assumed to be scarce, Postimees reports. Henrik Välja, CEO of the Estonian Forest and Wood Industries Association (EMPL), said that Russian timber continued to flow into Estonia through an illegal scheme whereby…
Strong winds and high waves disrupted ferry services to Estonia’s smaller islands on 3 July 2023, BNS reported. Ferry operator Kihnu Veeteed cancelled departures of the Kihnu Virve and Soela passenger ferries were cancelled during the day. Also, the Ormsö passenger ferry did not accept heavy vehicles on the Sviby-Rohuküla route.