By Christopher Bollyn
The Baltic ferry Estonia, en route from Tallinn to Stockholm
with some 1,000 passengers and crew on board, sank on September
28, 1994. Shortly after midnight, two concussions rocked the
ship. The ferry quickly listed to starboard and sank into the
frigid Baltic Sea in less than 45 minutes under circumstances
which can only be described as mysterious.
Although more than 500 Swedes were among the 852 reported dead,
the Swedish government has blocked every effort to recover the
bodies from the wreck. 
Even
an early offer by a Norwegian diving company to retrieve the
bodies at cost was rejected. Despite repeated promises from
two consecutive Swedish prime ministers that the bodies would
be retrieved and the wreck would be salvaged, three months after
Estonia sank the Swedish government announced that there would
be no recovery operation whatsoever. Instead of retrieving the
bodies, the government of Sweden hired a Dutch marine salvage
firm, Smit Tak BV, that specializes in neutralizing underwater
nuclear waste, spending $350 million in a failed attempt to
cover the ship in concrete. The wreck lies in soft mud at a
depth of between 60-80 meters.
MILITARY SHIPMENTS CONFIRMED
Recent revelations in the Swedish mass media that the ferry
was being used to smuggle Soviet military technology have confirmed
long-held suspicions that the unexplained sinking of Estonia
may have been connected to a secret space weapons cargo it was
carrying.
Immediately before Estonia left Tallinn on its final
voyage, Carl Övberg, a survivor and frequent passenger who had
arrived at the last minute, reported that the harbor had been
sealed off and that a military convoy had escorted two large
trucks to the waiting ferry. As soon as the trucks were loaded,
the ship's car ramp and bow visor were closed and the delayed
ferry sailed for Stockholm.
Swedish state television (SVT 1) broadcast an investigative
journalism program called Uppdrag Granskning on November
30, 2004, in which the former chief of customs in Stockholm
confessed that Estonia had indeed been used to transport
Soviet military technology to the West in September 1994. According
to former customs chief Lennart Henriksson, on two occasions
shortly before Estonia sank, vehicles carrying Soviet military
technology had been allowed to enter Sweden without any inspection.
"I have been walking around thinking about what happened for
ten years," Lennart Henriksson, Stockholm's former customs chief
said. "Each time Estonia's name came up I've thought
the little I know should be brought into the light of day. I
want to clear my conscience."
Henriksson had been ordered to allow certain vehicles carrying
Soviet military contraband to pass Swedish customs without inspection
on September 14 and 20, 1994, but was not working the day Estonia
sank because he was on vacation. Henriksson's confession sheds
new light on the sinking of Estonia. The ferry was a
joint venture between a private Swedish company, Nordström
& Thulin, and Estline, a company owned by the Estonian
government. Prior to the SVT 1exposé, reports of Soviet military
technology being smuggled on the ferry had been dismissed as
"conspiracy theories." Henriksson revealed that a secret agreement
existed to allow military contraband cargo to enter Sweden without
being inspected by customs. This arrangement was between Owe
Wictorin, then supreme commander of Sweden's military and Ulf
Larsson, then general director of Swedish customs. The arrangement
was known at the highest level of the government as well as
at the defense department.
Normally, Swedish customs searched every vehicle coming from
Estonia. That a vehicle was to pass without inspection was something
Henriksson had never seen in 38 years of service.
When the ferry arrived on Sept. 14, 1994, Henriksson spoke to
the driver of the expected vehicle, a Volvo 745 station wagon
driven by a Frank Larsson, a false identity. When Henriksson
told "Larsson" that customs was carrying out inspections, he
"gave me a look, but I said the search would be faked," Henriksson
said. "We opened a few boxes and as far as I could see it was
military electronics in them." The customs slip showed the car
belonging to a non-existent company called Ericsson Access AB,
a fictitious subsidiary of AB LM Ericsson Finance. No address
was given. Henriksson discovered later that the vehicle was
a rental car. There is no evidence that Ericsson was actually
involved in the smuggling. Although the Swedish military authorized
the smuggling, the final destination of the Soviet technology
is not known.
A week later, on September 20, 1994, a much larger shipment
of contraband technology arrived and was allowed to pass without
inspection. This time it was a van and, once again, Henriksson
merely glanced into the boxes. "What were you thinking this
second time?" reporter Lars Borgnäs asked. "I thought it was
a strange procedure," Henriksson said. "But orders are orders
and you don't reflect too much on why."
(…)
DISAPPEARED ESTONIANS
The mystery of the sinking of Estonia, however, has affected
some more than others. While survivors recovered and the relatives
and friends of those lost at sea mourned, a third group was
left completely in limbo, where it is to this day. To this third
group belong a dozen, or more, Estonian crew members who were
originally reported as having been rescued, only to have mysteriously
disappeared in the days following the disaster. The disappearance
of these 12 Estonia crew members points to a high-level
cover-up of an international intrigue. Recent revelations in
the Swedish press of "enforced disappearances" of two Egyptian
"terror suspects" carried out in Sweden in 2001 may shed light
on the fate of missing Estonia survivors. It was recently reported
in the Swedish media that a private Gulfstream 5 executive
jet, registered in the United States, played a role in the "extraordinary
rendition" of two Egyptian "terror suspects" from Sweden in
2001.
According to Swedish journalist Sven Anér, enforced disappearances
from Sweden are nothing new. There is a body of evidence that
similar abductions occurred in Sweden in the days following
the Estonia ferry disaster. Shortly after Estonia sank,
a dozen Estonian crewmembers, all evidently survivors of the
catastrophe - disappeared without a trace.
Documents indicate that U.S. registered private jets were used
in both the 1994 and 2001 disappearance cases. Anér has documents
from Sweden's civil aviation administration concerning two specific
aircraft suspected of being involved in the abduction of the
missing Estonians. Enforced disappearance, according to the
Rome Statute of 1998, "means the arrest, detention or abduction
of persons by, or with the authorization, support or acquiescence
of, a State or a political organization, followed by a refusal
to acknowledge that deprivation of freedom or to give information
on the fate or whereabouts of those persons, with the intention
of removing them from the protection of the law for a prolonged
period of time." Enforced disappearance, a form of kidnapping,
is considered a "crime against humanity," according to the Rome
Statute, which Sweden ratified in June 2001.
As many as 12 Estonian crew members, which official survivor
lists show having survived the sinking, disappeared in what
appears to be a government-organized abduction and enforced
disappearance. While the original survivor lists contain the
names of 146 individuals, the names of a dozen crew members
who had been listed as survivors, were deleted without explanation
from the lists maintained by the Swedish and Finnish authorities
in the days following the disaster. Anér has found 15 different
original lists of survivors, all of which include the names
of 11 Estonian crew members whose names were later deleted.
In order for a name to appear on the list, a survivor was required
to give his name, date of birth, status and nationality.
There is evidence that some surviving crewmembers were abducted
and taken to Stockholm's Arlanda airport whence they were flown
out of Sweden on two private aircraft. The abductions removed
key witnesses who would have been able to testify about the
condition of the ship, the cargo, and the cause of the sinking.
Chief among them were one of the ship's captains, Avo Piht,
who was on board but not on duty that night, and Chief Engineer
Lembit Leiger. It is thought that the others were crewmembers
who had shared the same life raft or been rescued with Piht
and Leiger in the same helicopter: Y-64.
(…)
This is just a brief excerpt of the article that you can read
in its full length in issue 1/2005.
For more details click here.
