Russia announced today, Tuesday, the inclusion of Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas and other prominent politicians from the Baltic states on the "wanted" list.

The Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that "these individuals are responsible for decisions that in fact constitute a desecration of historical memory," according to the Russian news agency TASS.

The Russian authorities accuse Baltic officials of demolishing monuments to Soviet soldiers.

In addition to Kallas, Estonian Minister of State Taimar Peterkop and Lithuanian Minister of Culture Simonas Kairys were included on the Moscow Interior Ministry's wanted list, according to Russian media.

This announcement is symbolic as none of these politicians are expected to travel to Russia anytime soon.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said via the Telegram app, explicitly referring to Kallas and Peterkop, "You must be held accountable for the crimes committed against the memory of those who liberated the world from Nazism and fascism. And this is just the beginning."

In the summer of 2022, a few months after the start of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, Estonia demolished a Soviet war memorial, which was an exact replica of a T-34 tank with a red Soviet star in the town of Narva on the border with Russia.

In 2007, the relocation of a bronze statue, another Soviet war memorial, from a park in Tallinn to the city's suburbs led to protests lasting several days. One person was killed in the riots and more than a thousand people were arrested. Angry Russian-speaking Estonians said the removal of the monument erased their history.

A number of Soviet-era landmarks in Lithuania were also dismantled after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Kairys, commenting on his inclusion on the list, said, "I am glad that my work in removing Soviet remnants has not gone unnoticed."