The congress was also attended by organizations whose members lay claim to lands and real estate in Russia: Germans from East Prussia (now the Kaliningrad region), Estonian Setos from Peipus region, and Finns who lived before 1944 on the Karelian Isthmus and in Karelia. The initiator of the Trieste congress was the Istrian Union, which unites 300,000 Italians expelled after the war from the Istrian peninsula on the Adriatic. This territory is now divided between Slovenia and Croatia. The Istrian Union is the richest and most influential among similar organizations. The Italian government finances its activities to the tune of about one and a half million euros per year. With this money, the Italian exiles, in particular, opened an office in Brussels and hired lawyers who now lobby the interests of forced migrants in the European Union. The first success has already been achieved: Brussels has promised to finance a pan-European association of exiles. The next step is to obtain an EU and UN declaration recognizing the injustice of depriving millions of people of their property due to border changes. The declaration will open a political opportunity to seek the return of property or compensation for its loss.
Finnish participants at the congress demanded the inclusion in the final document of a point on revising post-war borders, explaining that they are in worse condition than most other exiles: 'It is easy to move and litigate within the EU, but in Russia it is impossible to get a fair court decision.' However, the radical proposal was rejected as blocking the possibility of achieving real concessions from European governments.
One of the participants at the congress was Finnish lawyer Kari Silvennoinen, representing the interests of 88 former owners of real estate on the Karelian Isthmus, as well as their heirs. They are seeking the return of 61 farms and other property with adjoining land plots totaling 2,900 hectares. First, Kari Silvennoinen bombarded the Russian embassy in Helsinki with requests, but receiving no response, he filed a lawsuit with the European Court of Human Rights. However, that court also turned a deaf ear to the Finns' pleas. The European Court sent a reply stating that the lawsuit must first be considered in a Russian court.
'I have made an agreement with lawyers in St. Petersburg who helped me draw up a statement of claim. It has already been submitted to the relevant Russian authorities,' Silvennoinen said. He told congress participants that there is another path to victory – litigation in American courts: 'During the war, the Nazis stole a very valuable painting from an Austrian family. After the war, it ended up in a Vienna museum. The state refused to return the work of art to its rightful owners. But when the painting appeared at an exhibition in the USA, the heirs sued Austria in an American court and won the case. The painting was returned to the owners.'
The Finnish lawyer stated that he does not rule out starting a process in the USA using the following tactical move: Finnish companies, for example, Stora Enso, buy timber in Karelia, which is processed into paper and sold in the USA. In his opinion, such business from a legal point of view can be considered trade in stolen goods, since the owners of forest plots in Finland did not sell their property to Russia. Kari Silvennoinen's idea was listened to with interest at the congress, but the majority of participants believed that they should act gradually and together. First of all, they must achieve recognition by the EU and UN of the fact that the problem of exiles exists.
Aleksey Smirnov.
Novye Izvestiya