Foundation of Estonian National Independence Party by Väärtnõu
Tibetan Buddhist Encyclopedia is now 14 years old
Our Encyclopedia recently received a wonderful opportunity for a major renewal on its 14th birthday . After many years of growing our Encyclopedia had become bit slow and sometimes even decided not to answer when people knocked on the door.
A very big thank you and blessings to Dmytro Rudiy (rudiy.nl) for his great work in upgrading the server, website and all of the infrastructure and helping make TBE fast and reliable again for everyone!
We kindly ask our readers to help us cover the cost of this important upgrade and also help with the ongoing costs of keeping the Encyclopedia alive and freely available.
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OM AH HUM VAJRA GURU PADMA SIDDHI HUM 🙏🙏🙏
May blessings shower down on all of yous 🙏🙏🙏
In 1987, the leader of the Buddhist Brotherhood, Vello Väärtnõu, came up with the idea and programme of the Estonian National Independence Party. So, the Estonian Buddhist Brotherhood can be considered a part of the Estonian fight for independence. Taola was the only place that printed, copied and disseminated leaflets. At the time of the creation of the ENIP, Väärtnõu was helped by Tiina Hallik, Anu Rootalu and Eve Pärnaste, who acted as the secretary of Taola, and by other members of the Brotherhood. On 30 January 1988, Väärtnõu organised a press conference in Moscow for accredited foreign newspapers and made a public announcement of the establishment of an opposition party. This event was covered in the press around the world, but not a word was published in the local press. However, the news spread like a wildfire among the public. The Brotherhood’s house was under constant surveillance by the KGB, the Buddhist library was “cleaned” on several occasions, and the militia was used against Taola. All this resulted in the deportation of Väärtnõu from the country by the personal order of Gorbatshev in February 1988.
The deportation of Väärtnõu and others put an end to the successful activities of the first team of the Buddhist Brotherhood in Estonia. For years, Väärtnõu lived and studied with Khenpo Namgyal from a Bhutanese Monastery in the Himalayas, and later lived in Sweden.