The Baltic states refer to Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. The three countries are very diverse and individual in their kind, however they share similar histories and are united by a stregth to endure hardship and prosper in freedom. The concept of the "Baltic states" can be said to have been physically realized on August 23, 1989, when approximately two million people joined their hands to form a 600-kilometer human chain across the three countries in the event known as the Baltic Way.Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania became sovereign nations in the aftermath of World War I. They declared independence in 1918, fought independence wars against German freikorps and Bolshevist Russia, and were recognized as independent countries in 1920. The three Baltic nations re-declared their independence between 1990 and 1991, and their independence was recognized by the Soviet Union on September 6, 1991.Despite the three nations' similarities in culture and history, their languages belong to two distinct language families. The Latvian and Lithuanian languages make up the group of Baltic languages which belongs to the Indo-European language family. The Estonian language, on the other hand, is not an Indo-European language and instead belongs to the Baltic-Finnic subgroup of the Finno-Ugric languages.

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