0 >President Kersti Kaljulaid meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow during a 2019 official visit. Source: Stanislav Moškov, VPK
A Russian organization says it has withdrawn its participation from this summer s VIII World Congress of Finno-Ugric Peoples, to be hosted in Tartu, citing political reasons. The announcement came within twenty-four hours of Estonia s move to expel one Russian diplomat, in solidarity with the Czech Republic.
A statement made by the Association of the Finno-Ugric Peoples of the Russian Federation, the cultural body overseeing Russia s participation, announced Friday that it would not be taking part.
The statement (link in Russian) said that: .in our opinion, destructive, clearly politicized tendencies have begun to manifest themselves more and more clearly, in the activities of the World Congresses of Finno-Ugric Peoples, where the Finno-Ugric map is used as one of the methods of pressurizing on one country or anoth