ISS Appeals Court Order on Past Publication
After Tallinn District Court odered the Internal Security Service (ISS) to remove a sentence from its website regarding Center Party MP and former deputy mayor of Tallinn Yana Toom, the security agency is filing an appeal to the Supreme Court.
Head of the ISS Arnold Sinisalu told uudised.err.ee on Monday that the claims published in the annual report are accurate and the agency will appeal to have the decision of the appeals court annuled and the decision of the administrative that ruled in favor of the agency, upheld.
On Friday, the court ordered ISS to remove a sentence that Toom had goaded schools to lobby against the move to change over to Estonian as the language of instruction. The court stopped short of requiring printed copies of the yearbook from being removed from libraries and other institutions.
Toom told ERR radio on Friday that the court’s ruling is a good signal because a similar ruling is expected on 5 May regarding her fellow party member Mihhail Stalnuhhin and also Mihhail Kõlvart.
The ISS yearbook in question is the one published in April 2012. The book discusses attempts by the Russian Federation to work against the transition to Estonian as the language in 60 percent of upper secondary schools and named several officials, such as Tallinn Deputy Mayor Mihhail Kõvart and Center Party MP Mihhail Stalnuhhin, then chairman of Narva City Council. The latter two have also sued on various grounds. Stalnuhhin's case is currently in a lower court. Kõlvart lost his case in lower court in April last year and appealed.