Today most Russians live in Tallinn and the major northeastern cities of Narva, Kohtla-Järve,
Jõhvi, and
Sillamäe. The rural areas are populated almost entirely by ethnic Estonians, except for the coast of
Lake Peipus, which has a long history of
Old Believers communities. There are efforts by the Estonian government to improve its tie with the Russian community with, e.g., one former prime minister,
Jüri Ratas learning Russian to better communicate with them. Former President
Kersti Kaljulaid has also been considered a defender of the interests of the Russian-speaking minority, having previously moved to
Narva in order to "better understand the people and their problems". The younger generation is better integrated with the rest of the country such as joining the military via conscription and improving their Estonian language skills. and
2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Citizenship The restored republic recognised citizenship only for the pre-occupation citizens or descendants from such (including the long-term Russian settlers from earlier influxes, such as Lake Peipus coast and the 10,000 residents of the Petseri County), rather than to grant Estonian nationality to all Estonian-resident Soviet citizens. The Citizenship Act provides the following requirements for naturalisation of those people who had arrived in the country after 1940, the majority of whom were ethnic Russians: knowledge of the Estonian language, Constitution and a pledge of loyalty to Estonia. The government offers free preparation courses for the examination on the Constitution and the Citizenship Act, and reimburses up to 380 euros for language studies. Under the law, residents without citizenship may not elect the
Riigikogu (the parliament) nor the
European Parliament, but are eligible to vote in the municipal elections. As of 2 July 2010, 84.1% of Estonian residents are Estonian citizens, 8.6% are citizens of other countries (mainly
Russia) and 7.3% are "persons with undetermined citizenship". Between 1992 and 2007 about 147,000 people acquired Estonian or Russian citizenship, or left the country, bringing the proportion of stateless residents from 32% down to about 8 percent. According to
Amnesty International's 2015 report, approximately 6.8% of Estonia's population are not citizens of the country. In late 2014 an amendment to the law was proposed that would give Estonian citizenship to children of non-citizen parents who have resided in Estonia for at least five years.
Language requirements The perceived difficulty of the language tests became a point of international contention, as the government of the
Russian Federation and a number of human rights organizations objected on the grounds that they made it hard for many Russians who had not learned the language to gain the citizenship in the short term. As a result, the tests were altered somewhat, due to which the number of
stateless persons steadily decreased. According to Estonian officials, in 1992, 32% of residents lacked any form of citizenship. In May 2009, the Population register reported that 7.6% of residents have
undefined citizenship and 8.4% have foreign citizenship, mostly Russian. As the Russian Federation was recognized as the
successor state to the Soviet Union, all former USSR citizens qualified for natural-born citizenship of Russia, available upon request, as provided by the law "On the RSFSR Citizenship" in force up to the end of 2000.
Socioeconomic status According to a 2016 report by the
European Centre for Minority Issues, the Russian-speaking population in Estonia faced significant challenges in the labor market and education after the post-Soviet transition, which fostered a persistent perception of inequality among minority groups. Today, health conditions and access to healthcare are similar for both majority and minority populations. However, accumulated disadvantages affect marginalized Russian-speaking communities, who experience higher rates of extreme poverty, incarceration, homelessness, drug abuse, and HIV/AIDS. These issues contribute to social exclusion and may hinder the right to health for ethnic Russians and other minorities. Additionally, the reduced use of Russian in healthcare services has emerged as a new challenge, given Estonia's demographic composition. Estonian statistics show that ethnic Russians and Russian-speakers are disproportionately represented in a number of areas, including: In 2021, some pundits advanced as speculation that since 2019,
Conservative People's Party of Estonia support grew in the Russian community (notably in
Ida-Viru County which has a majority of Russians), despite the party's
Estonian nationalism and oftentimes anti-Russian rhetoric and positions. This was speculated by them to be attributable to the party opposition to
European Union federalism and the softening of the rhetoric of the party at the time on Russia, and to its then coalition with the Centre Party. However, despite these claims, the Conservative People's party underperformed in Ida-Viru County during the
2023 Estonian parliamentary election, with only 8.4% of the votes in that county, their lowest result. In that county, the leftist and Russian minority-oriented
Estonian United Left Party performed a breakthrough during this election and obtained 14.9% of the votes. This party also performed better in
Tallinn, where a significant Russian minority live, than in most other parts of Estonia.
By county ==Notable Russians from Estonia==