ESTONIA FACTS

* Mining and manufacturing provide about 75 percent of the country's output, with agriculture and fishing making up about 20 percent.

* Ethnic Russians make up about 35 percent of the 1.5 million residents of Estonia.

* Inhabitants of Estonia have higher average incomes than residents of any of the other former Soviet republics.

* Estonia's new currency, the kroon, is backed by $120 million in gold and timber reserves, and is pegged to the German mark at the rate of eight kroons to one mark.

* The Estonian language resembles Finnish, though most speak Russian as well.

* The nation was independent from 1918 to 1940.

* During the 1940s, about one-tenth of Estonia's population was sent to Siberia as punishment for their opposition to Soviet rule and other beliefs.

* About 130,000 Russian troops remain in Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, complicating the process of establishing independent institutions.

* Estonia and Finland, 50 miles apart across the Gulf of Finland, have signed a pledge to boost trade between the two countries.