Kaja Kallas, the anti-Putin ‘hawk’ who will replace Borrell as head of EU diplomacy

Kaja Kallas (Tallinn, 1977) will be the new face of the European Union abroad. The Estonian Prime Minister will replace Josep Borrell as High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy at a time when the war in Ukraine is the main document on the table. In fact the election of one of the most belligerent voices against Vladimir Putin – who has put him in charge of the search and seizure for the demolition of monuments to Soviet soldiers built on his territory – is causing a crisis in some European regions.

“Russia’s move is not surprising at all. It is further proof that I am doing the right thing: the EU’s strong support for Ukraine is a success and hurts Russia. The Kremlin now hopes that this move will help silence me and others, but it will not. Quite the opposite. I will continue to strongly support Ukraine. I will continue to defend the increase in Europe’s defense, ”Kallas said in response to the decision taken by Moscow in February. His words now serve as a declaration of intention about what his position as the head of European diplomacy will be like at a time when the EU has put security and defense policy at the center of its action and calls for an increase in military spending are becoming more frequent.

The 294 kilometer border separating Russia and Estonia largely explains why Kallas is one of the EU’s bulwarks against Putin. The notion of security in Western countries has nothing to do with the Baltic countries, where tensions with Moscow are constantly high. Even NATO has a specific air police in the Baltics dedicated mainly to countering Russian fighters invading the airspace.

In this context, Kallas has been one of the strongest voices against Russia and in favour of EU support for Ukraine. He also warned of an escalation of the conflict if Kiev does not resist. “Russia must lose to avoid a third world war,” he said recently. Raising his tone to that point generated disapproval from some leaders, including Pedro Sánchez, who called for “containment”: “You cannot talk joyfully about a third world war.”

However, EU leaders have agreed to keep one of the most aggressive voices against Putin at the head of European diplomacy for the next term, when, depending on what happens in the elections in the United States, a new horizon may be opened with regard to support for Ukraine and, therefore, options to start talking about peace processes. Whether this is a good idea, time will tell.

In search of a new balance

“We know that the management of our eastern border with Calais is in good hands, but we have asked him to take into account that the Russian threat goes beyond Russia and Ukraine to the Sahel, which is very important for us, and that we do not stop looking towards Latin America,” reported Spanish diplomatic sources, who assure that a “balance” will be found, as in the case of Borrell, who was asked “to know how to look to the East.”

The other major front of the EU’s foreign policy is the conflict in the Middle East. On this issue, a deeply divisive issue in the community club, Borrell has had a clearly pro-Palestinian position and has been one of the most important voices against Benjamin Netanyahu’s government for the massacre in the Gaza Strip. However, Kallas has followed the lead of European countries in supporting Israel’s “right to self-defense” after the October 7 Hamas attacks and the two-state solution. Israel will celebrate the change.

EU leaders have chosen one of their own to take over the reins of European foreign policy. Now Estonia must choose a new prime minister. Kallas, the first woman to lead a government, took over the leadership of the Reform Party in 2018, a position previously held by her father, who was also prime minister for a short time at the beginning of the century and later vice president of the European Commission. Although Kallas won the election in 2019, she came to power two years later after the resignation of Jüri Ratas (leader of the Center Party). She won again in the 2023 elections and relaunched the coalition.

A lawyer by profession, Kallas’ experience in Brussels is not new. In addition to her participation in the European Council since 2021, she was an MEP between 2014 and 2018, when she left the record to return to national politics, in which she took her first steps as a deputy in 2011. Her national career has positioned her as one of the main leaders of the European liberal family, of which she is part through the ALDE party. Although some see her as candidate for the position of president For the last Europeans, blurring the candidacy with other leaders was not an option for Kallas, who would now be the highest representative of an Eastern country in one of these. Top Jobs Of the European Union.

Russian husband’s profession

Last August, news broke that a company linked to Kallas’ husband continued to do business with Russia, despite his government’s official position being that trade relations should be completely interrupted. The company in question is Stark Logistics, a transport company that said it was still making shipments to Russia, although most of the goods it transported fell under sanctions, so it had to reorient its activity towards other countries.

According to the company’s executive director, the goods being transported right now are not approved and are leftover stock. Before the war, February 24, 2022, Stark Logistics managed 60 to 70 shipments per week and now only manages two, belonging to AS Metaprint, a company that manufactures metal containers.

The news caused a stir in Estonia, as Stark Logistics is approximately 25% owned by Novaria Consult, a consultancy run by Kallas’ husband Arvo Hallik.

Furthermore, it emerged that the Prime Minister had granted a loan of 350,000 euros to Holík’s company.

And as the Estonian media recalled then, in December 2022 Prime Minister Kallas said that there should be no economic transactions with Russia and that the Estonian state-owned company Operail would not have to participate in the transportation of Russian nickel to Finland.

In April of this year, Kallas said that “in war, everything is black or white and you have to choose a side” and added that businessmen, among others, must have “moral and ethical guidelines”.

In relation to the news of transportation to Russia, the Prime Minister responded in a statement that her husband “does not have clients from the Russian Federation”, but that his company is “helping to terminate the productive activities of one of his clients”, an Estonian company in Russia.

He stressed, “I believe that as long as the Russian aggression against Ukraine continues, all trade and economic activity with Russia must stop.”