TALLINN, Estonia — A statue of a Red Army Soldier at the heart of deadly riots in Estonia was re-erected at a military cemetery in the capital Monday, overlooking dozens of Russian war graves.

The cemetery will also be the new resting place of Red Army soldiers being exhumed from a downtown memorial. Archeologists excavating the grave said they had found nine coffins by Monday, but had not yet opened them.

The Bronze soldier's removal from the downtown memorial last week provoked sharp criticism from Moscow and rioting in Estonia — the worst since the Baltic country quit the Soviet Union in 1991. One man was stabbed to death, more than 150 people were hurt and 1,100 were detained.

Ethnic Russians consider the exhumations and the statue's removal an insult to the Soviet Army, which pushed the Nazis from Estonia in 1944. Some ethnic Estonians, however, see the monument as a bitter reminder of Soviet occupation.

The dispute has further strained tense relations between Russia and Estonia and underscored long-standing complaints about the treatment of ethnic Russian minorities in ex-Soviet Baltic states. A group of visiting Russian lawmakers called on the Estonian government to resign.

While Russian speakers in Baltic countries enjoyed advantages under Soviet rule, many now struggle to get education, deal with government offices and get jobs amid a resurgence in native languages and inroads by English.

Estonian authorities said they were increasingly uneasy about pro-Russian protests at its embassies in Moscow and Kiev, the Ukrainian capital.

Protesters have all but blockaded the embassy in Moscow, erecting tents on an adjacent sidewalk, holding candle vigils, plastering cars with anti-Estonian stickers and passing out "Wanted" posters with pictures of the Estonian ambassador.

"It is our boycott so that they can't move around Russia," Lev Venetsky, a "Young Russia" activist in Moscow, told AP Television News in Moscow. "We think there is nothing for fascists to do in Russia."

Estonia's Foreign Ministry sent a letter of protest to the Russian government, saying "the lives and safety of the embassy staff and family members are directly endangered."

In Kiev, police used tear gas against some 50 Communist Party protesters after someone threw a small can of paint at the Estonian Embassy, the Interfax news agency reported. Police said no one was injured.

Russian officials called the statue's removal "blasphemous"; Estonia accused Russian media of spreading lies about the situation.

"The Estonian government of Prime Minister Andrus Ansip, after these actions, it must resign. That is the fundamental position of our delegation," said Leonid Slutsky, the leader of the Russian group of lawmakers visiting Tallinn.

Estonian legislator Kristiina Ojuland said she had urged the Russian group to "understand the seriousness of the situation" at the Estonian Embassy in Moscow.

Estonia's government has said the memorial's location near a busy intersection was not a proper place for a war grave. Ethnic Russians said the real reason was to pander to Estonian nationalists who wanted the monument removed.

The moving of the memorial drew criticism from others. The Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Center called it an insult to the victims of the Nazis.

While recognizing the crimes committed under Soviet rule, "it must never be forgotten that it was the Red Army which effectively stopped the mass murder conducted by the Nazis and their local collaborators on Estonian soil," said Efraim Zuroff, the center's chief Nazi hunter.

In Berlin, meanwhile, police said 17 bronze torches were stolen from a Soviet war memorial that commemorates the German capital's capture by the Soviet army in 1945. Park employees discovered the theft Monday morning at the memorial in the Niederschoenhausen neighborhood.

The monument is one of three Russian war memorials in Berlin. Germany promised Russia it would maintain the memorials after the withdrawal of Russian troops from former East Germany.

The Tallinn cemetery where the Bronze Soldier now stands is about 2 miles from the city center.

Established in 1887, it holds mostly Russian and Estonian soldiers killed during the wars of the 20th century. It also contains graves of Germans soldiers who died in World War I and 112 British sailors killed during Estonia's war of independence in 1918-1920.

A headstone in front of the 6 1/2-foot statue reads, "To the unknown Soldier," in Estonian and Russian.

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