Excerpts from Books and Wikipedia
"Estonia is the northernmost of the three Baltic states, and it has longstanding ethnic and linguistic ties to Finland. During the period of Soviet control from 1940 to 1991, Estonia’s demographic structure transformed drastically: today about 23 percent of its 1.3 million inhabitants are Russians, most of whom came here as colonizers. After an initially difficult period of adjustment, Estonia has forged ahead of its Baltic neighbors, Latvia and Lithuania. Busy traffic links Tallinn, the capital, with its nearby counterpart in Finland, Helsinki, and a free-trade zone at Muuga Harbor facilitates commerce with Russia. But more important for this country’s future was its entry into the European Union in 2004. Since then, Estonia has gained attention as a result of its economic advances, particularly its creative entrepreneurship in the high-tech and software industries (Skype, for instance, was originally an Estonian company). Having entered the Euro zone in 2011, Estonia has developed an economy that has remained vigorous, and we classify it here as a stable component of the European Core." [Geography: Realms, Regions, and Concepts, 17th Edition, p. 188]