While rest of EU mourns, Baltics recall Gorbachev as agent of repression

Flowers are placed in memory of the final leader of the Soviet Union Mikhail Gorbachev, who died at the age of 91, at the office of the Gorbachev Foundation in Moscow, Russia, August 31, 2022. REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov

Widely praised in the West as a towering statesman who helped end the Cold War, Mikhail Gorbachev was remembered in the Baltic states on Wednesday as a repressive autocrat who unsuccessfully tried to stop them from breaking away from the Soviet Union.

The last Soviet leader, who died aged 91 on Tuesday, tried to prevent Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania from seceding after all three declared independence in 1990 after five decades under Moscow's rule.