Integration monitor is a daily Latvian press digest on ethnic minority and society integration issues. The Monitor reviews the biggest Latvian dailies: Diena, Latvijas Avize, Neatkariga (in Latvian language), Vesti Segodnya (in Russian language). In specific cases other information sources are used. Latvian Centre for Human Rights is not responsible for information published by the media.

Integration and Minority Information Service of the Latvian Centre for Human Rights

• State Service of Education Quality (SSEQ) requested to evaluate the loyalty of all teachers at the school which employs Mr Rafalskis
• Saeima’s committee refused a proposal to allow ethnic identity record in passports

The State Service of Education Quality (SSEQ) requested the management of the school which employs the teacher Vladislavs Rafalskis to evaluate all of the school’s teachers regarding their correspondence to the requirements of the Education Law and in particular, how patriotically they educate students. As reported, the students of the school collected signatures against the dismissal of Mr Rafalskis. According to a representative of the SSEQ, it is suspicious that the letter in support of Vladislavs Rafalskis was signed not only by students taught by Rafalskis but also by other students. Vesti Segodnya

The Saeima’s committee refused a proposal of the nationalists’ union to restore voluntary ethnic identity record in passports. The main arguments against such record are: deficiency of the official classificatory of ethnicities which does not contain all possible ethnicities; the fact that during the first independence such record did not exist in the passports; the ethnic identity record does not correspond to international practice; the European Commission against Racism and Intolerance in 2007 recommended Latvia to take out such record from the passports. According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the record of ethnic identity also has confused foreign institutions because sometimes it was interpreted as second citizenship. The nationalists’ union, in its turn, believes that voluntary record of ethnicity in passport strengthens person’s identity. Latvijas Avize

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Integration Monitor