• Politician Aleksandrs Kirsteins: if you do not assimilate you will be assimilated by others

Neatkariga prints an interview with the member of the Riga City Council Aleksandrs Kirsteins (nationalists union All for Latvia/FF-LNIM). According to Mr Kirsteins, Latvia currently faces problems with integration because the only way how to prevent such problem was assimilation of ethnic minorities but the state authorities ignored it 20 years ago and still do. Mr Kirsteins believes that the citizenship should be granted only to assimilated incomers but Latvia has granted citizenship to everyone. Regarding to the issue on restitution of Jewish properties, Mr Kirsteins considers that it is wrong to compensate the loss of Jewish properties during the Holocaust to the association named Council of the Jewish Communities of Latvia because it was established recently and cannot be considered as the direct inheritor of Jewish people who lost their properties.

• Police will not check how the millionaire Sergejs Zaharjins received Latvian citizenship
• Vesti Segodnya: unified examination in Latvian language reduces the chances of graduators of Russian language schools to proceed for university scholarship

The State Police refused to initiate a criminal procedure against the head of the board of the biggest Latvian metallurgical enterprise “Liepajas Metalurgs”, millionaire Sergejs Zaharjins checking whether he legally received Latvian citizenship. Sergejs Zaharjins received Latvian citizenship trough naturalisation procedure in 1999. However, the police received a complaint by a person who asserts that the state language proficiency of Mr Zaharjins is too low and doubts that he could pass the naturalisation procedure legally. Neatkariga

According to Vesti Segodnya, unified state examination in Latvia language reduces the chances of graduators of Russian language schools to proceed for scholarship in the state funded higher education establishment. The main evaluation criteria for admission to higher education establishment are evaluation received in Latvian language examination and in profile subject.  But, considering that for ethnic minority students it is much harder to receive high evaluation in the state language examination than for those for whom Latvian is a native language, the examination reduces the chances of the minority students to receive scholarship. The newspaper reports about a case when a student of a Russian language school who graduated school with excellence, failed to receive scholarship at university due to insufficient evaluation in the Latvian language exam.

• Politician Edgars Jaunups: it is inconsiderate and short-sighted for political parties to refuse categorically cooperation with the Concord Centre

One of the leaders of an association For Development of Latvia Edgars Jaunups (one of the ex-leaders of the political party Unity) believes it is very inconsiderate and short-sighted for political parties to refuse categorically cooperation with the Concord Centre which represents the majority of Russian speaking residents. Mr Jaunups believes that exclusion of the Concord Centre from the coalition does not correspond to the interests of the society in general. At the same time, Mr Jaunups considers that the Concord Centre needs to improve its programme and define position about very important issues. Diena

• Congress of Non-citizens: Latvia should take major steps to solve the non-citizenship problem before taking the Presidency of the Council of the European Union in July 2015

 

According to Elizabete Krivcova, one of the leaders of the Congress of Non-citizens, Latvia should take major steps to solve the non-citizenship problem before taking the Presidency of the Council of the European Union in July 2015. The Congress opened its English-language version of its webpage www.noncitizens.eu , informing about the problem and asking to sign the petition to overhaul citizenship laws to restore full rights. According to Elizabete Krivcova, the Congress welcomes all efforts to solve the problem and is open to dialogue on all issues except the fundamental European values – human rights and minority protection. Regarding the initiative to establish a museum of the institute of non-citizenship, Elizabete Krivcova believes that the work should begin with development of the content, which would complement the museum of occupation, and this can be displayed on the internet and as travelling exhibition. The Congress of non-citizens is unofficial association which claims to represent the interests of Latvia's non-citizens, whose voting rights were revoked since 1991. Vesti-Segodnya

• Straume: Lend a hand to the Concord Centre!

 

Diena interviewed one of the former leaders of the radical nationalist party "For Fatherland and Freedom / Latvian National Independence Movement" Janis Straume. Mr.Straume believes the results of municipal elections in Riga are very good for the integration of society: the common list of "Honour to Serve Riga" and "Concord Centre" included both ethnic Latvian and ethnic Russian candidates and they got elected as part of the same list. This is despite the fact that previously in other election lists, candidates of the "wrong" ethnic identity would often be stricken-off by the voters, as Latvian election system envisages voting for candidate lists and allows the voters to strike-off undesirable candidates. Mr.Straume believes that the Concord Centre (a party mainly supported by ethnic minorities) has been deceived several times and now ethnic Latvians should "lend a hand" to the Concord Centre. He highlights that parties are not homogenous and include both modern, pragmatic people on one hand, as well as "people who bring automatic rifles to the kindergartens and fight at the Freedom Monument" on the other. Mr.Straume believes that Latvian security services were interested to distract attention of the society away from economic problems and therefore allowed Vladimirs Lindermans to organise referendum on the status of Russian language in February 2012. Diena (05.08.2013), Latvijas Avize, NRA, Vesti-Segodnya