Russian Ambassador: Lack of Border Treaty Hampering Investment
Russia's ambassador to Estonia,Yuri Merzlyakov, has said that the absence of a border treaty between the two countries is stifling trade relations and making large Russian companies reluctant to bring in their investment roubles.
Speaking at an Employers' Confederation conference held in Tallinn on June 7, the ambassador characterized economic relations between Russia and Estonia as good, but said that artificial roadblocks to their development should be removed, rus.err.ee reported.
Specifically Merzlyakov said that large Russian companies interested in investing in Estonia, particularly those working in the area of transit, are put off by the lack of a border agreement.
Merzlyakov's statement in support of concluding a border treaty is nothing new – when taking up his post last October he announced that it was one of his main priorities.
Märt Volmer, head of the Foreign Ministry's Third Political Department, countered that solving the border treaty issue would be no magic pill for trade. "I don't think that if we sign it the problems will evaporate. But this, of course, doesn't mean that the topic doesn't need tending to," he said.
The two countries came close to signing a border treaty in 2005 but the process came to a halt at the 11th hour when the Russian Duma withheld ratification, claiming that the inclusion of a reference to the 1920 Tartu Peace Treaty in the document's ratification law constituted a territorial pretension by Estonia. Soon afterward, then Russian president Vladimir Putin withdrew Russia's signature from the treaty.
Steve Roman