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Moscow certain Russia-Estonia border treaty to be ratified soon

The Russian foreign minister has agreed with Russian lawmakers saying Russia-Estonia relations are complicated

MOSCOW, January 21. /TASS/. There are no doubts over the Estonian border issue and Moscow is certain that a corresponding treaty will be ratified soon, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told a news conference in Moscow on Wednesday.

“I am certain that the treaty will be ratified. In Estonia this process has not been completed yet, either. In Russia it is the government’s prerogative to initiate the ratification process by submitted a corresponding bill to the State Duma. I hope that we will start this process in the near future,” Lavrov said.

“Our legislators are right when they point to the complicated climate in our relations, but there are no doubts about the border issue,” Lavrov said.

“Estonia’s previous foreign minister, Urmas Paet, and myself had originally expected that my visit to Tallinn for the ratification of instruments of verification might take place in May. This will depend on the atmosphere in our relations,” he added.

The line of the state border between the two countries was agreed in 2005 after nearly eleven years of talks. A border treaty was signed shortly afterwards, but when it was submitted for ratification, the Estonian legislators included in the preamble a mention of the Tartu treaty of 1920 in a context that left a potential loophole for territorial claims against Moscow. Russia revoked its signature and the process remained legally incomplete. Talks on the problem resumed in late 2012.