Estonian prime minister refuses to tone down rhetoric on Russia despite U.S. requests: ‘Putin is a dictator who kills women and children’

Estonian Prime Minister Kristen Michal told Delfi that he intends to keep speaking openly about the threat Russia poses.Reuters reported that Pentagon officials urged the Baltic states, including Estonia, to avoid overly sharp statements toward Moscow. Michal told reporters he had received no such requests directly from the U.S.“I’m not going to hold back. Putin is a dictator who kills women and children. And he will keep doing so until he is forced to change course,” Michal said. Currying favor with dictators, he said, leads only to humiliation and ultimately does nothing to protect freedom.Estonia is doing its part to defend NATO’s eastern flank, allocating almost 7% of its GDP to the alliance’s needs, he said. A willingness to “call a wolf a wolf, rather than a forest dog” is also necessary for ensuring security. Michal added that Estonia’s firm stance and clear statements “give Russia no peace.”Reuters earlier reported, citing sources, that Pentagon officials had approached Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia with a request to tone down their rhetoric toward Moscow.Elbridge Colby, head of the Pentagon’s policy directorate, cited the phrase “cornered like a rat” as an example of inappropriate rhetoric. Michal used it to describe Putin in late September while discussing a rise in sabotage incidents.At Meduza, we are committed to transparency about our use of artificial intelligence in the newsroom. The story you’re reading was written by one of our living, breathing journalists and translated from Russian using an AI model configured to follow our strict editorial standards. This translation process is the result of extensive testing and refinements to ensure our English-language coverage is timely and accurate. A Meduza editor reviews every draft before publication.If you find any errors in this translation, please contact us at [email protected].To read Meduza’s exclusive content in English, please subscribe to our newsletter.