www.baltictimes.com
Feb 07, 2007 By TBT staff

MOSCOW - Sergei Ivanov, Russia’s deputy prime minister and minister of defense, on Wednesday repeated his criticism of the possibility that Estonia would relocate the Bronze Soldier monument.
“We called things by their right names. I, for instance, called it state vandalism,” Ivanov was quoted by Interfax news agency as saying after a meeting by the State Duma (Russia’s lower chamber of parliament).
Ivanov argued that political posturing ahead of certain internal political events, a vague reference to the upcoming national elections in March, lay behind Estonian authorities’ decision.
Putin: Return buried soldiers to Russia

Russian President Vladimir Putin has called for the remains of fallen Soviet fighters buried under Tallinn’s Bronze Soldier monument to be returned to Russian soil. “If it comes to the demolition of the monument and the reburial of our soldiers’ sacred remains, we are ready to propose to the present Estonian leadership to rebury them in the territory of the Russian Federation,” Putin told the Interfax news agency.
Putin’s comments are a tad premature. The Estonian government is still divided on the issue (The Center Party votes to keep the Bronze thing, while the opposition parties and Reformists (lead coalition partner) want it gone. Parliament passed laws permitting the relocation, but no decision to act on those laws has been made.

Hmmm, who cleans the bird droppings ?

Putin would later point out:
“In many states of Europe, the monuments to Soviet soldiers are not simply standing, they are even, I’m ashamed to say, looked after better than we do it in Russia,” Putin said.