Estonians Urged to Help Homeland

Pro-democracy leaders in Estonia, hoping to elect the first non-Communist congress in the Baltic republic since the Soviet Union occupied it during World War II, are conducting a worldwide drive to register Estonians to vote, a spokesman said Sunday.

Speaking at a Bell Canyon home to about three dozen people, Tunne Kelam, head of the Estonian National Independence Party, said election of a 500-member congress would be a first step toward achieving independence from the Soviet Union, which still has 150,000 troops in Estonia.

“We have been in prison, in a very cruel prison, for half a century. . . . To really have our independence back we must have independent political structures,” Kelam said.

Kelam’s speech, at the home of attorney Jaak Treiman, honorary consul for Estonia on the West Coast, was part of a worldwide tour aimed at drumming up support for Estonia, where nationalists have stepped up pressure for independence along with pro-democracy leaders in East Germany, Hungary and Czechoslovakia.

Kelam said Estonian independence strategists plan to hold elections for the new congress Feb. 24, just before elections for the Soviet-dominated assembly that governs Estonia. The new congress would open negotiations with the Soviet Union aimed at winning more political and economic autonomy for Estonia.

So far, about 500,000 Estonians have registered, he said. In addition to the 1.6 million living in the republic, another 100,000 Estonians live abroad, said Kelam. All are eligible to register, he said.

Although the elections for the new congress are not sanctioned by Soviet authorities, Kelam said he doesn’t expect the Soviets to interfere with them.

“They’re too weak,” he said. “They can’t really use force any more. They are so clumsy, they can’t react in time.”

The act of registering for the elections, he said, represents a “very important psychological change that is taking place in the minds of the people.”

“They have been intimidated to such an extent during the past years that by registering themselves, this is an act of . . . political and moral courage,” he said. “So, they are surpassing this fear.”

Kelam said the glasnost policies of Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev present a “paradoxical situation” for Estonian nationalists. Although those policies promise greater political openness, they still are controlled by the Communist Party and therefore carry no guarantees of true independence for Estonia, he said.