• Initiator of the Congress of Non-Citizens Elizabete Krivcova: the Parliament of Non-Citizens should be established because the state does not want to solve problems of non-citizens

 According to one of the initiators of the Congress of Non-Citizens Elizabete Krivcova, Latvian state does not want to solve problem of non-citizenship. Therefore, activists of the civil society took this duty and decided to establish the Parliament of Unrepresented. Elizabete Krivcova believes that the Congress of Non-Citizens is a new stage of human rights advocacy – when the activists stopped to complain and took active position.  Vesti Segodnya

• The Ombudsman recognised discrimination in an insulting phrase addressed to a black-skinned participant of a local TV talent show
• Society Integration Foundation informed the MPs about its work
• Public Relations Advisor to the Minister of Education Reinis Tukiss resigned from the post because Minister Vjaceslavs Dombrovskis speaks Russian with Russian colleagues
• Latvian Muslims deny risks of Islamic radicalisation in Latvia

The Ombudsman recognised discrimination in an insulting phrase addressed to a black-skinned participant of a local TV talent show Lingita Bopulu. During the live broadcast on a TV channel “Kanals 2” the following comment was published: “It is time for Lingita to go to Africa to pick bananas.” According to the Ombudsman, such statement says that Lingita is not welcomed in Latvia due to her origin which violates the legal norms on prohibition of discrimination included also the in the Law on Electronic Mass Media. The Ombudsman stated that the prohibition of discrimination concerns also hateful discriminating statements.

In their turn, representatives of the TV channel responding to the Ombudsman stated the comment is not hateful and its interpretation could be very broad. At the same time, the TV channel promised to evaluate the comments more carefully before publishing and to avoid publishing of discriminative statements. Vesti Segodnya

The Society Integration Foundation informed the MPs about its work and children exchange program between Latvian and Russian speaking families aimed at integration. 50 Latvian speaking and 50 Russian speaking families took part in the exchange, thus about 600 people including family members got to know each other. The families hosted children for 6-12 days and during this period children took part in school activities with special tasks, participated in sports, attended cultural events, played with fellows. Commenting such practice, the MPs from the nationalists union All for Latvia!-FF/LNIM criticised the fact that ethnic Latvian children are hosted by the Russian families. Vesti Segodnya

Latvijas Avize reports that Public Relations Advisor to the Minister of Education and Science Reinis Tukiss resigned from the post because the Minister Vjaceslavs Dombrovskis spoke Russian to the head of the Minister’s Office Anna Kononova. Commenting the situation, the Minister did not deny that his native language is Russian and acknowledged that he speaks Russian to other native speakers of Russian, including his colleagues. The Minister stressed that the official communication language in the Ministry is Latvian. Also the Parliamentary Secretary of the Ministry Inga Vanaga stated that communication with the Minister Dombrovskis and Mrs Kononova is in Latvian only and the Ministry’s sessions are always in Latvian language. Latvijas Avize also notes, that according to unofficial information Reinis Tukiss resigned due to inability to collaborate with the Minister due to different working style.

The Riga Mosque’s Imam Zahers in an interview with Latvijas Avize denies that there are radical Muslims in Latvia. Commenting the visit of Islamic organisation “Tablight Jamaat” to Latvia, the Imam says that members of this organisation are normal people who live in Europe and are its citizens and they believe that it is their mission to visit Muslims in different countries. The Imam also denies the assertion of the Security Police that this organisation might create risk of radicalisation of Latvian society as in some countries “Tablight Jamaat” is considered as radical and terrorist organisation. According to the Imam, there are about 10,000 Muslims in Latvia and they live in accordance with Latvian legal acts and at the same time preserve their Islamic identity.

• Office of Citizenship and Migration Affairs: about 300 people renounce Latvian citizenship every year
• Working group on promotion of naturalisation process elaborated some proposals
• Jewish organisations conducted seminars about Jewish people living in Latvia
• 53% of Latvian residents support transition of education in municipal kindergartens into Latvian language
• The last native speaker of Livonian language has died

 According to a representative of the Office of Citizenship and Migration Affairs (OCMA), about 300 people renounce Latvian citizenship every year. About 100 people are deprived of the citizenship according to court decisions every yearly because of acceptance of other country’s citizenship without notifying the OCMA about it.  Persons who renounce Latvian citizenship most often receive Russian citizenship. Among European countries, most frequently persons choose German, United Kingdom’s and Swedish citizenship. Citizenship of one of the European countries usually is chosen by young and middle aged people, but Russian citizenship is more popular among older people. Vesti Segodnya

 According to the head of the parliamentary working group on promotion of naturalisation process Valdis Liepins, the state cannot affect all the main reasons why non-citizens do not naturalise as those reasons are the belief that Latvian citizenship should be granted them automatically, expectation for easier procedure, and the right to travel to the CIS countries without visas. Mr Liepins says the aim of the working group is not to find the ways how to increase the number of new citizens but how to improve the quality of the naturalisation procedure in order to make the new citizens to integrate in the society easier. Among the proposals of the working group there are: restructuring of the web site about naturalisation making it more user friendly and issuing materials motivating for naturalisation; changing the content of the naturalisation tests making those more oriented on comprehension instead of the memory and adding questions about modern Latvian culture; creating special courses for naturalisation applicants which would help to improve language proficiency, learn about Latvian history and culture. Latvijas Avize

 Latvijas Avize reports about a series of seminars about Jews in Latvia, their culture and life. The seminars were organised in different Latvian cities by Jewish organisations with an aim to promote comprehension about mutual relations between Jews and Latvians.

 According to a public opinion survey conducted by agency TNS and LNT, 53% of Latvian residents support transition of education in municipal kindergartens into Latvian language. 43% of respondents do not support it. Telegraf

The last native speaker of Livonian language Grizelda Kristina has died in Canada, aged 103. There remain around 15 people who communicate in Livonian freely. Livonians are a Finno-Ugric indigenous people of Latvia. Vesti Segodnya

• Newspapers report about the process of the elections to the Parliament of Unrepresented
• MP Janis Urbanovics: Concord Centre is not a mono-ethnic party anymore
• Representatives of Latvian intelligentsia criticize the success of the Concord Centre in Riga

Vesti Segodnya and Latvijas Avize report about the elections to the Parliament of Unrepresented initiated by non-governmental organisation Congress of Non-Citizens (CN). The first day of the elections was held on the same day with the municipal elections. According to a representative of the CN Elizabete Krivcova, 2,100 persons voted at the special polling stations in Riga and other Latvian cities and more than 1,000 on the Internet by the 6 p.m. of the first elections day. The elections will continue until 11 June.

Neatkariga prints an interview with the head of the Saeima’s faction of the Concord Centre (CC) in the Saeima Janis Urbanovics. Mr Urbanovics believes that the results of the local elections in Riga prove that CC is not a mono-ethnic party anymore because it gain support also from ethnic Latvians. However, Mr Urbanovics does not agree that there was no ethnic voting at all, but he believes that a large step was made towards overcoming ethnic voting. As reported, the CC got more than 58% of votes in Riga.

Vesti Segodnya reports about some of the comments from representatives of Latvian intelligentsia about the results of the local elections in Riga. Commenting the victory of the Concord Centre (CC) at the elections, writer Gundega Repse stated “I did not think that Riga will be given to occupants”. The other well-known writer Mara Zalite stated that ethnic Latvians who voted for the CC betrayed Latvia’s interests. Shortly before the elections, Latvian theatre director Alvis Hermanis compared those who vote for the CC with the "lumpens", alleged ethnic Russians who vote for the CC as having schizophrenic state of mind, and compared ethnic Latvian old ladies who vote for this party because of the free-of-charge local transportation with prostitutes who sell themselves for more expensive price.

• The Concord Centre convincingly won in Riga – more than 58% of voters supported it.

Newspapers report about the results of the local elections in Latvia held on 1 June. In Riga, the Concord Centre received 58,54 % of votes or 39 out of 60 mandates in the City Council. This means that effective Mayor of Riga Nils Usakovs will remain to be the head of the city. The nationalists’ party All for Latvia!-FF/LNIM received 17,86% or 12 mandates and the Unity received 14,13% or 9 mandates. One of the main opponents of Nils Usakovs, the candidate for the post of Mayor of Riga Sarmite Elerte (the Unity), who originally had the first sequence number in the Unity candidate list, was moved to the third place in the list because the voters put the largest number of “cross outs” to her name. Experts commenting the results of elections, believe that the failure of many so-called “ethnic Latvian” parties in Riga could be explained by the fact that those were not able to unite for the elections. The elections were also characterised by very low activity of the voters – only 45,85% of the residents who have the right to vote took part in the elections.