In remarks delivered ahead of the NATO summit, US President Barack Obama pledged to protect the alliance's smaller members. DW asked Estonian experts and politicians to share their impressions in Tallinn, reports GHN based on dw.de
Ladies in cocktail dresses and men wearing bow-ties and others in Estonian Navy uniforms were slowly heading to their seats at Nordea Concert Hall in downtown Tallinn on Wednesday. On the speaker system, a US pop song's chorus of "You're the perfect man for me, I love you I do" preceded the guest of honor's arrival.
Moments later, US President Barack Obama - in Estonia ahead of the NATO summit in Wales on Thursday - was greeted by the colorful crowd. After meeting with Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian counterparts, Obama addressed a roomful of Estonian officials and experts who praised the remarks as a strong and clear message to their region.
Equality of NATO members
Obama spent more than half an hour reaffirming NATO's commitment to protect its eastern members amid growing Baltic concern over developments in Ukraine. He won a round of applause for saying that "the defense of Tallinn and Riga and Vilnius is just as important as the defense of Berlin and Paris and London."
Obama's remarks carried "a very important security message for us," Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet told Deutsche Welle after the speech. "That means that all member states are equal, and it doesn't matter if the country is big or small, the security level for all NATO countries is the same."
The Baltic countries grew wary of their territorial integrity after Russia annexed Crimea in March, claiming that it was moving to protect the peninsula's Russian-speaking majority population.
The former Soviet-occupied republics Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, all with sizeable ethnic Russian populations of their own, are worried that Moscow might use the same excuse again. "The concern is that Russia sees Russians abroad as a possible reason or prerequisite to invade into the country," Paet said.