Zapad, which means "west" in Russian, is a joint military drill conducted by the Russian and Belarussian armies along Russia's northwestern border with Europe, which is also NATO territory. The 2017 exercise, which takes place from September 14 to 20, is one of Russia's four annually rotating regional training operations that tests military strategy and troop preparedness by simulating war.

The Zapad games originated in the Soviet Union and the last exercises took place in 2009 and 2013. In the aftermath of those drills, NATO accused Russia of secretly using them to prepare tactics for its subsequent military invasions of Georgia in 2008 and Crimea and east Ukraine in 2014. NATO also accused Russia of ending both years' drills with hypothetical nuclear strikes on European nations.

According to the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe's (OSCE) 2011 Vienna Document, a nation must allow other states to observe its military drill if more than 13,000 troops are involved. Russia has said only 12,700 troops will take part. However, western security analysts have pegged the number as high as 100,000.

Russia has denied NATO's allegations that Zapad-2017 will mobilize troops in violation of international agreements; it insists it is being fully transparent in its preparations and operations. Russia's Deputy Defense Minister Alexander Fomin (above) told DW that Zapad-2017 "is absolutely peaceful, and absolutely defensive in nature." He also denied that the practice maneuver was directed at NATO.

While NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has welcomed Russia's troop disclosure, he also has said that the Western military alliance with roots in the Cold War has "every reason to believe it may be substantially more troops participating than the official reported numbers" based on previous drills. "NATO remains calm and vigilant," he said in early September while in Estonia (above).

German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen also claimed Russia will deploy "over 100,000" troops in the Zapad-2017 games. In January, Germany sent around 450 troops to Lithuania as part of a NATO mission. Lithuania, a former Soviet republic, is also uneasy about the Russian war games. Above (right), von der Leyen inspects the deployed German troops with Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite.

Politicians are not the only ones voicing concern over Zapad-2017. One week ahead of the maneuvers' start, around 200 Belarusians hit the streets of the capital, Minsk, to protest the military drills. Some 7,200 Belarusian troops will participate, Russia has said, and military exercises will be concentrated in the nation with close ties to Russia. A protest banner reads "For peaceful Belarus."

The World War II memorial in Riga divides public opinion. Some see it as a symbol for the Soviet victory over fascism, whilst others - mostly Latvians - consider it as a symbol of the subsequent Soviet occupation.

Latvia's second-largest city Daugavpils is geographically and socially detached from Riga, with a population of over 50 percent ethnic Russians. The Kremlin has been keen to politicize the issue of non-citizens, with many fearing a similar separatism scenario to the one in Ukraine playing out in Latvia.

Daugavpils has a population of just under 100,000 - a decrease of almost 10 percent since 2009 as people leave in the hope of better lives in western Europe. Daugavpils has also been portrayed as a potential hotbed for separatism.

Evgeny Drobat, a member of the Communist Party in the years during the transition to independence, told DW that he refuses to recognize Latvia's occupation - a prerequisite for taking the Latvian naturalization exam. He voted against the law which would establish many Russian-speakers as "non-citizens."

Evgeny shows his "non-citizen" passport, which includes the title "alien" under his picture. This denies him full voting rights, entry to various professions, residency and working rights in the EU - just a few of almost 100 legal restrictions.

Riga - the cosmopolitan capital of Latvia - has seen a 13-percent decrease in its population since joining the EU. Even though official language is Latvian, Russian is spoken predominantly in the streets. Alexandr Aleksandrov, himself an "alien," thinks it’s all part of a bigger problem. "A lot of Russians who came here during the occupation were aggressively pushed out of society," he told DW.

"I don’ t feel victimized [by the status], I don't feel that separate, but in general I feel on the sidelines. I was thinking how this affected me, my vision; probably it did a lot." Alexandr maintains a level-headed approach. "The fact that Latvia was annexed legally, albeit using force, doesn’t make it any better."

Baltic states were hit hard during the 2008 financial crash. Severe austerity contributed to the rise of social problems and a spike in emigration and subsequent depopulation. "Non-citizens," however, are denied working rights in the EU, among other legal restrictions.

This memorial in Riga is dedicated to those who stood at the barricades in 1991. "Many Russians stood together with Latvians, and now they have to prove their loyalty?" said Aleksei Vasiljev, a teacher in Daugavpils. Aleksei, however, also said that the Russian-speakers in Daugavpils have "two presidents - one of them is Putin."

Yelena Vecena, director of a school in Daugavpils, says that "language is not an obstacle to those who want to learn and to communicate." To become a Latvian citizen, it's necessary to take a naturalization exam, covering the basics of the constitution and language skills. The key question, however, is: "Do you recognize the Soviet occupation of Latvia?" For many, this remains a moral obstacle.

... deliver your mail! Starship Technologies wants to replace pizza pickups, shopping trips and post office runs with robots bringing food and mail to your doorstep. Launched by two Skype co-founders, Starship has offices in Tallinn, London, Washington, D.C., California and Hamburg, where Domino's and logistics company Hermes are currently testing the WALL-E resembling robot.

Described as a "blockchain-based 'stock exchange' for startups," four-year-old Funderbeam was named best European fintech company this year. The startup is headquartered in Tallinn's Telliskivi Creative City, which is also home to a number of other well-known ventures like language app Lingvist as well as co-working spaces including Lift99.

You could call Mait Müntel the quintessential entrepreneur: While the Estonian was working as a particle physicist at CERN in Switzerland, he had the idea to use the same machine learning algorithms he used to find the Higgs boson to teach himself French. The rest, as they say, is history: Müntel now leads a team of 40 developing AI-powered language learning app Lingvist.

Many attribute Estonia's outsized startup success to Skype, the video chat software Microsoft acquired in 2011 for $8.5 billion. The founders not only went on to launch TransferWise, Starship Technologies and other startups, they also inspired a whole generation of founders, often collectively referred to as Estonian Mafia. With 31 startups per 100,000 inhabitants, Estonia places third in Europe.

e-Drive Retro turns fossil fuel-powered oldtimers into fully equipped electric vehicles. EVs are the fastest-growing segment of the multi-billion global luxury car market. US-American founder Michael M. Richardson was one of the first foreigners to join the e-residency program, a digital ID launched in 2014 that allows non-Estonians to run a business in the EU from anywhere in the world.

Is this the future of urban mass transit? With mobile ticketing app Jiffi, commuters travel cashless and hands-free. Upon boarding a bus, tram, metro or ferry, Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) sensors detect the app; Upon exit, the app selects the best fare and bills automatically. For now, Jiffi is in a testing phase with a group of 70 people on public buses in Tartu, Estonia's second-largest city.

Inspired by an article about how austronauts grow food during space missions, Estonian-born Mattias Lepp brought the space tech down to earth to help city dwellers and other earthlings grow their own vegetables, herbs and plants. Since its inception in 2010, Click & Grow has sold over 350,000 indoor gardens and farms. The latter are bigger, standalone units that can grow up to 51 plants at once.

Can this startup deliver the quantum leap in battery power the world has been waiting for? Skeleton Technologies believes so, calling itself the "global leader in energy-storage systems and graphene-based supercapacitors," which have high power density, almost instant recharging and very long lifetimes. The European Space Agency supplier does its manufacturing in Germany and its R&D in Tallinn.