• State Language Centre reproved the Corruption Prevention and Combating Bureau for bilingual posters
• Latvijas Avize: a year after referendum on status of Russian language
• Ombudsman Juris Jansons: integration of immigrants is not topical issue for Latvia

The State Language Centre (SLC) reproved the Corruption Prevention and Combating Bureau for bilingual posters. The Bureau began a campaign on prevention of corruption in health care and issued posters with a text in Latvian and Russian languages together. It was planned to put the posters in medical institutions. However, according to the SLC, the bilingual posters cannot be placed in public places because it is violation of the State Language Law. Head of the Bureau Jaroslavs Strelcenoks explained that the posters got issued in two languages with an aim to target as large number of residents as possible. However, due to reproach of the SLC, instead of bilingual posters the Bureau will distribute publicly only posters in Latvian language. Diena

Latvijas Avize prints an article about the referendum on granting Russian language status of a state language in Latvia conducted a year ago and about any changes in integration field since then. According to the article, despite the fact that right after the referendum the politicians argued about the failure of integration policy and the need to improve, almost no practical steps were made to improve it. Also, up to this day, no research was made in order to discover why about 25% of citizens voted for Russian language, what were the reasons and where are the problems. According to a resident of Latgale (Eastern region of Latvia, the majority of  its residents voted for Russian language) interviewed by the newspaper, for many people who voted for Russian language it was more a social protest against existing state policy

The Ombudsman Juris Jansons believes integration of immigrants is not a topical issue for Latvia because Latvia is not attractive in terms of social support, employment and other opportunities. The Ombudsman also believes that violation of human rights of asylum seekers in not a top problem in Latvia and there are no flagrant violations regarding their accommodation conditions. Neatkariga

• Mayor of Riga Nils Usakovs: party For Native Language is a “project” formed by the security services and the Unity
• Saeima partly ratified the European Social Charter

The party For Native Language (FNL) proposed the Concord Centre (CC) to run for the municipal election in Riga within one list.  The Mayor of Riga and the leader of the Concord Centre Nils Usakovs in response to the proposal stated that the FNL is a “project” formed by the security services and the Unity with an aim to deprive the CC some votes of electors in Riga. Potentially, some part of the CC voters might switch to support the FNL, thus taking votes from the CC which are important in order to receive more than 50% of all votes and to remain the governing party in Riga. According to sociologists, it is unlikely that the FNL will gather enough votes to overcome the 4.5% threshold in order to receive a seat in the City Council, and therefore, these votes would be split between both the Concord Centre and the Unity. Vesti Segodnya, Latvijas Avize

Yesterday, the Saeima partly ratified the European Social Charter. Ratification of the Charter makes a number of its articles which guarantees social and economic human rights binding to Latvia. However, the Saeima only partly ratified some of the articles. For instance, the Parliament did not ratify the provision which stipulates that all workers have the right to a fair remuneration sufficient for a decent standard of living for themselves and their families. The Saeima refused also to ratify the article 23 on right of every elderly person to social protection supported only by the oppositional parties.  Vesti Segodnya

 

• Party the Unity tries to justify statement by its candidate to the post of the Mayor of Riga Sarmite Elerte about usage of Russian language at the city council

The political party Unity distributed clarifications regarding recent statement of its candidate to the post of the Mayor of Riga Sarmite Elerte about usage of Russian language at the city council. The Unity stated that Mrs Elerte’s statement made at a TV show “Uncensored” that the city council should accept complaints written also in Russian language got wrongly interpreted. According to the Unity, Mrs Elerte wanted to say that the state language in Latvia is Latvian and the residents should appeal to the city council in Latvian language. But in those cases, when a person who speaks only some foreign language turns to the council, the city council should find a way how to help such persons, for instance, to write a complaint in Latvian from the words of a person. Vesti Segodnya

• Citizens non-Latvians might be allowed to change their ethnicity to “ethnic Latvian”
• Riga Latvian Society organises free-of-charge courses for non-citizens

Latvijas Avize reports about draft amendments which allow ethnic non-Latvians to change a record in the Population Register about their ethnicity to “ethnic Latvian”. According to the draft amendments, Latvian citizen who has resided in Latvia permanently during the last 15 years, is proficient in Latvian language for the highest level, feels belonging to Latvian culture and wants to strengthen the Latvian nation publicly has the right to change his/her ethnicity to “ethnic Latvian.” Authors of the draft amendments – the MPs of the Unity and the Reforms’ Party – believe ethnic identity of a person forms trough education and upbringing process, therefore a person who feels belonging to ethnic Latvian nation should have such option to change his/her officially registered ethnicity. The draft amendments do not envisage the option to register his/her minority ethnicity on the basis of self-identification. At present, Latvian residents are able to change one’s ethnicity based only on ethnic origin of relatives within two generations.

The Riga Latvian Society organises free-of-charge courses for Latvian non-citizens with an aim to prepare them for naturalisation. The courses include learning of Latvian language, learning about Latvian culture and other issues which could help to pass the naturalisation test successfully. Vesti Segodnya

• Representatives of the Congress of Non-citizens are planning to conduct the alternative elections on 1 June 2013
• Senate of the Supreme Court forwarded a case on referendum on non-citizens to the Constitutional Court
• Society Integration Foundation announced a grant application for projects on exchange of children among ethnic Latvian and Russian families

Representatives of the Congress of Non-citizens are planning to conduct the alternative elections at the same day with the municipal elections on 1 June 2013. All Latvian residents regardless of their citizenship status are called to participate the alternative elections with an aim to choose an alternative parliament representing Latvian non-citizens. It is planned that the parliament of non-citizens will express opinion of non-citizens with an aim to liquidate non-citizenship in Latvia. Vesti Segodnya

The Senate of the Supreme Court suspended proceedings on a case on referendum on non-citizens and asked the Constitutional Court to evaluate it. As reported, in November 2012, the Central Elections Committee (CEC) refused to conduct state funded collection of signatures in support of referendum on granting Latvian citizenship to non-citizens despite the fact that the required number of signatures of Latvian citizens was collected. The CEC argued that the draft law is not fully developed and contradicts the Latvian Constitution and Declaration of Latvian independence. The initiators of the referendum appealed the decision arguing the CEC exceeded its authority. The Senate of the Supreme Court asked the Constitutional Court to evaluate whether the draft amendments proposed for referendum correspond to Latvian Constitution. Latvijas Avize, Vesti Segodnya

The Society Integration Foundation announced a grant application for projects on exchange of children among ethnic Latvian and Russian families with an aim to promote integration. The same projects were implemented in 2012. Vesti Segodnya