Nov 17
AleksHistory
RIGA — The following is my translation of the editorial published in the Russian-language newspaper Segodnya on November 18, 1925, Latvia’s 7th independence anniversary. I kept the original emboldened text.
Seven years of independence, seven years of independent existence … In the history of the nation, this is a short term. But for the newly created state, it is considerable, the testing period of our viability and a possibility of independent political existence. Our country has withstood this test and the acknowledgement of this basic fact is the greatest achievement of these difficult first years. Sacrifices had not been offered in vain, the blood of freedom fighters, whom we have to remember first of all today, was spilled onto the native land as fruitful seeds from which a mighty tree of liberty and independence is growing.
Today’s celebration must remind us of great values, which we’ve obtained seven years ago. Those values have not disappeared, but have developed and strengthened. Liberty, democratic system, equality of all before the law — these are the benefits we often forget amidst workaday life, political squabbles and quarrels. With all imperfection of our system, with all its shortcomings, in the presence of these fundamentals presents citizens with an opportunity to feel as free people, who live in a free country, who have an opportunity to develop their own individual strengths, develop their own pecuniary and spiritual culture. Only by comparison with the enslavement one can cherish the true happiness of liberty. We often underestimate the great importance for each of us the opportunity to employ basic rights of personal immunity, right to own property and security. These benefits must be cherished as the apple of one’s eye and be placed above various political arguments and disagreements.
We have been reminded of this in the recent days when the country found a new master, the newly elected Saeima. With all diversity of the political parties, with all diversity of interests, the idea of supreme sovereignty must be paramount and not a single government combination should — or better yet must — not weaken it. Unfortunately, very often the fog of political squabbles hides the basic principles of our state, built on equality and liberty. For harmonious development of our country, it is necessary to use all forces capable of creation. Not a single one of them must be discarded under the influence of various sentiments. Again, it is impossible to hide the fact that this demand for a correct development of our political life is not being followed. Attitude toward national minorities, which is so vividly shown in recent days, is a striking illustration of this prejudice that is not suitable for the state and is harmful to the state.
Without a slight exaggeration, one can say the fundamentals of the state, which came into existence seven years ago and are enshrined into the Constitution presented an opportunity to build a state and its institutions for the benefit of all citizens. It is necessary for the current builders to follow the style of the building, so that they would not build annexes from the previous periods and eras.
After the first years of trials, the creative work is quite possible. And the international situation does not interfere. Locarno Treaties delivers a new spirit of peace and promises in the future to create stable necessary balance and for new states a much-needed peace. Latvia, in the last seven years, has striven to do anything possible to solidify peace, and of course, in the future it will be faithful to this policy.
In a Russian fairy-tale, a child who has just turned 7 is the most skilled person in solving riddles presented before him. He solves them quickly and get a piece of good luck for himself and his near relations.
Let our seven-year-old country be as lucky and as happy in resolving complicated riddles put before her. For behind all party and class disagreements lies something unifying, something that stand above all squabbles. It is prosperity — both financial and spiritual – for all people inhabiting this country regardless of their class or nationality.
Apr 13
AleksPolitics, Society
RIGA – “Where do I go sign up to protect the Russian schools,” a distraught voice of a teacher-friend of mine blasted into my ear. “Latvians now want to close all our schools. We want to protest.”
The All for Latvia party has spearheaded the effort to collect the first batch of signatures to amend the constitution, allowing state money to pay for education in Latvian only. The campaign took some convincing, particularly in the eastern region of Latvia. In 15 months, it had taken the party to collect more than 10,000 signatures required, only 91 came from Latgale.
It’s reminiscent of the 2004 school reform protests when thousands of Russian students flooded the streets in protest of the government’s decision to switch the language of instruction to Latvian for high school students. It was the largest minority demonstration in the country’s new history.
An ongoing push to amend the constitution effectively closing schools with a minority language of instruction resemble more of a badly written play on a political theater stage than any serious initiative that aims to boost the prestige of the Latvian language among the Russian-speaking minority and – most importantly – improves the quality of education in this country.
10,140 signatures has been collected at the Museum of the Occupation, countryside, schools and public places. The number of signatures gives the supporters access to public funding, but narrowing down the time limit whereby they have to collect signatures from the 10 percent of the voters. It’ll be a big surprise if the group succeeds getting more than 153,000 signatures required to submit the legislation to the parliament.
Public outrage over the language issues seems to outweigh the outrage over the fact that more than 10,000 students between ages 5 and 18 are not registered in any of learning institutions. Some may have immigrated with their parents. Others simply quit the mandatory education. We don’t worry about our country’s economic competitiveness, our country’s wealth, instead we worry about the language of instruction.
The proposed amendment violates even the spirit of the 1918 republic, in a country where historically, schools in minority languages have been funded by the state. The move resonates more with the 1934 anti-democratic coup, which paved the way to a wide-shouldered Ossetian to take over Latvia in 1940.
The constitutional amendment is not the aim of this enterprise. It’s public relations. Having no substance on economics and job creation, the party has this one issue it aims to keep in the public light. The evil russkies. A recent diatribe by the notorious Dr. Slucis (in English), who called from his comfy Minnesota job on Latvians to build a wall on the Russian border, prompted a counter-reaction.
Two extremist groups – the Osipov Party (the link is in Russian), led by the young struggling-to-speak-Latvian Evgeny Osipov and the January 13 movement, led by the Russian deportee Vladimir Ilych Linderman, a former member of the National Bolshevik Party, began collecting signatures and funding for a counterattack: to introduce Russian as a second state language.
Organizations on both sides of the issue are taking hostage the future generations of Latvians, whose education’s quality is somehow lost in the never-ending battle over languages.
Apr 12
AleksSociety
RIGA – After Pussylounge Bar, this Elizabetes street designer clothes store has one of the funniest names in the city. It takes its name from a 2001 movie “Blow” with Johnny Depp and Penelope Cruz. The film – favored by the store’s owners – tells a story of George Jung, the man who established the American cocaine market in the 1970s. I heard a story over the weekend that the owners are planning to open a store for kids clothes in the same neighborhood. They wanted to call it “Blow for Kids” until someone had convinced them to change the name to something else. Now they call their kids clothes store “Yellow.”
Apr 11
AleksEconomy, Society, The Dombrovskis government
A sign in Russian reads: "Stop the genocide"
RIGA – Words are a powerful tool. They paint a picture. They persuade. They dissuade. They arose people to war. They declare peace.
They matter in a public discourse. They set the public mood and reveal the mindset of its leaders, who rely on words to persuade the armies of Joe Six-packs.
Sloppy word usage is destructive.
Mayor of the seaside town of Ventspils, Aivars Lembergs – described by a colleague as a miniature Silvio Berlusconi – compared the international bailout to the Auschwitz concentration camp, on the eve of the Auschwitz liberation anniversary this January.
“If you’re placed into the Auschwitz concentration camp against your will and you survive, then it makes sense to praise you for your perseverance and heroism. But if you yourself go to Auschwitz and sign up to live there, how can one praise you? One can only wonder about you, how stupid you really are. Latvian political leaders have led Latvia into Auschwitz and voluntarily forced the people to live there,” Lembergs said.
Last week, Lembergs urged to extend the time this country spends in Auschwitz.
Auschwitz is not the only overpowering metaphor used in the public discourse. Of all the ways to describe the economic crisis, the populists’ favorite word is genocide.
On a recent cold sunny spring day, several hundred people gathered outside the presidential castle to protest. The crowd – surrounded by banners from opportunistic marginals like globaisti.lv – had a slew of demands. Their main demand was to “stop genocide of the people of Latvia.”
“Everything is done to destroy the Latvian state. Why are we all working now? My children and my grandchildren would have to work to pay back to the International Monetary Fund?” said one Latvian protestor to TV-3 journalists.
The public perception – cynical it may be – is that the government is intentionally and systematically killing off its own people by raising taxes, hiking electricity rates, raising retirement age. It fits into the general narrative of the Latvian suffering in the 20th century, a cornerstone of the modern Latvian ethnic identity. Moscow and Berlin both raped these people, pillaged their homes, deported and killed their men, women and children. It is bound to leave scars on the psyche. It is the worst thing they can think of when they describe their dire conditions.
Ironically, the frequent use of the word “genocide” makes the actual genocide seem less terrible. With more days of mourning than of celebration on the country’s political calendar, the word “genocide” has devalued so much that today it means very little. In the future, perhaps, the word could be used to describe a rainbow of feelings – from sadness to extreme joy. Teenagers could embrace the word to use it to describe something they like. As in “Dude, that’s genocide.” Ok, Latvian teens don’t use the word “dude.” But nevertheless, no longer it’s a reference to the Holocaust, or even to the deportations of 1941 and 1949. It’s now a reference to the current government policies as if reincarnated Hitler’s henchmen run the government. I struggle to picture the finance minister Andris Vilks as Goebbels.
Some of the public grievances are legitimate. The times are tough and socially unfair. The highest-earning employee of the central bank had claimed 44,000 lats (US$88,000) in child benefits for his family last year as he continued to earn. It turned out to be perfectly legal. At the same time, a family in Riga lives on a disability and Ls 8 ($16) child benefit unable to find work in this crisis. Policy makers are more concerned with populist slogans than with social justice. It’s frustrating. But it’s hardly genocide.
Nov 11
AleksHistory, Personal, Society
RIGA – I discovered this picture in my family photo archive several days ago. The second from the left is my great uncle, my great-grandmother’s brother, Vasily. He is wearing the interwar Latvia’s uniform, though I don’t know where he served or what rank he held. Nor do I know who the other people in the photo are or where exactly the photo was taken. The two men on the far right are the most puzzling. Why are they holding hands?
The great-uncle comes from the family’s Old Believer side, who had lived in the region of Latgale for centuries. Vasily was born in 1920, so this photo must have been taken between 1938 – when he turned 18 – and 1940, the year when the Soviets dismantled the Latvian army along with the Latvian state. He went on to serve in the Red Army after the Latvian military units became part of the Soviet military force. During the war, he fought against the Nazi Germany. According to my grandmother, Vasily was wounded several times near Moscow, and, eventually, killed.
My photo discovery coincided with the Lāčplēša Diena or the Bear Slayer’s Day, a day when Latvia remembers all its soldiers who fought in all wars. Unlike the UK Remembrance Day, Latvia’s military holiday has no connection to the end of the First World War. It marks a day when the almost one-year-old Latvian republic chased the West Russian Volunteer Army out of Riga. “Riga is liberated,” hailed the Russian-language newspaper “Segodnya” in its November 19, 1919 edition. “The nightmare of the 30-day assault entered the pages of the heartless history,” its editorial said.
Today, Latvia is remembering the Bear Slayer’s Day with military parades, candle-light vigil, concerts and remembrance services in Pārdaugava, where the Latvian army defeated the enemy, awarding medals to those soldiers who died defending their country. Even a reenactment. One is reminded of Latvian soldiers serving in Afghanistan and three Latvian UN workers abducted in Sudan.
Today is a day free of historical interpretations. It lays diametrically opposite other days on Latvia’s political calendar such as May 9 or March 16. A motion to elevate this day to remember all fallen soldiers regardless whether they fought on the German or the Soviet side seemed to have failed as the people appear to prefer controversy over remembrance.
Nov 09
AleksNational Minorities, Politics, The Dombrovskis government
RIGA – The parliament today is likely to allow Foreign Minister Ģirts Valdis Kristovskis to keep his job. In the first week since his appointment, Kristovskis has come under fire after his emails exchange revealed his agreeing with xenophobic statements (some links are in Latvian) of a Latvian-American doctor, one of the party sponsors.
The incident illustrates the Prime Minister Valdis Dombrovskis’s Unity bloc as a disunited eclectic political force.
Latvia's Foreign Minister Girts Valdis Kristovskis
It also suggests Kristovskis’ own seeming inability to lead the party bloc. His mishandling of a petty mini-scandal resembles the
Nasing Spešl scandal of the former finance minister Atis Slakteris, who went on to become a national joke. Insignificant in and of itself, the scandal marked the beginning of the end for the People’s Party, which swept the general elections four years ago. Kristovskis’ mishandling of the email revelation could also backfire and plummet the Unity popularity among the moderate voices, making it easier for the opposition to wreck havoc with the Unity agenda including a call for snap elections.
It also worth noting that the incident has coincided with the former member of the parliament Vaira Paegle‘s decision to quit politics. The former head of the NATO parliamentary committee, Paegle said she has been disappointed with the Latvia’s lie-infested political culture still in existence 20 years after the fall of the Soviet Union. She said the Unity party bloc reminded her of the People’s Party before its collapse. Even though she was offered a seat in the parliament, she declined. She quit the Civic Union. She decided to move back to the US to be with her family.
The Kristovskis scandal also shows the Unity’s seeming inability to manage public relations crises. Reasonable explanation has deteriorated to the point that the single enemy is to blame for all Latvia’s sins. Member of the European Parliament Sandra Kalniete’s hysterical press release over the weekend hinted between the lines that pro-Moscow forces and its allies in the parliament were to blame for the smear campaign – according to Kalniete it is one of 10 upcoming revelations – against the Unity and the Civic Union. It is as if Moscow was to blame for all Latvia’s ills, including the deepest economic recession in the world. The press release seem to suggest that one cannot assume that the Kristovskis’ email politesse in an attempt to raise money from abroad shifted his own political views closer to the diaspora Latvians, who wish to see Latvia Russian-free by any means possible.
It doesn’t help though that the Kristovskis’ own views remain a mystery. Perhaps, his views are conducive to the audience he is addressing. In most of Kristovskis’ public statements, it was impossible to learn what his views on integration and the Russian minority actually were. What was clear though that he attacked journalists for reporting it and his own fellow party members for leaking the correspondence.
Nov 05
AleksThe Dombrovskis government
RIGA – Mayo Clinic in the United States said Thursday it would launch an investigation into one of its employees after its Facebook page has been flooded with calls to fire Aivars Slucis, one of its employees, who espoused xenophobic views in a year-old email to Ģirts Valdis Kristovskis, Latvia’s future foreign minister.
“We are investigating the Dr. Slucis matter,” the clinic said. ”This statement in no way reflects the views of Mayo Clinic.”
The clinic’s Facebook page received several comments mostly from people with the Russian last names, calling on an investigation, suspension, or firing of Dr. Slucis.
“Hello, most famous racist clinic in te[sic] wold. How are you? Would you be so kind to answer me, what is the whole list of nations that are not welcome in your clinic? Jews? Gipsies? Slavic nations? You are so brilliant! Uncle Adolf would be proud of you,” reads one post.
The incident underscores that it is impossible to promote racism to an audience that would share that view while maintaining an image of a diverse open-minded person to another audience in the age of the internet. It also illustrates the provincialism of Latvia’s new foreign minister.
Kristovskis could have nipped the incident in the bud if he had called for a press conference and explained his own views on diversity. He could have explained that ethnic discrimination on any level is unacceptable in a country that is a member of the European Union and NATO. He could have said that he believes that there shouldn’t be a discrimination in Latvia based on one’s ethnicity. He could have come out as a bigger man in this debate, leaving no doubt regarding his own views on Slucis’ xenophobic comments.
Instead, he chose to chide the media for reporting it. He chose to demand that he be apologized and that the media find the guilty person who leaked the e-mail in the first place. He chose to play the blame game instead of distancing himself from the whole incident and the extremist views of the American-Latvian doctor.
Nov 04
AleksHistory, National Minorities, Parliament, Politics, The Dombrovskis government
Count Monte Kristo, Latvia's new foreign minister
RIGA – A presumably old foreign Latvian wished I had never been born.
“Too bad his mother did not abort him, nor Arajs plant him as a fertilizer for weeds,” said the anonymous poster, who goes under the name of Mr. L. L. on a website for the Latvian diaspora. The site’s admin deleted this portion of the post, which I didn’t really find offensive. I prefer not to take idiots seriously.
So unlike our new foreign minister, the leader of the Unity bloc, Ģirts Valdis Kristovskis. In search of glory and public appeasement he is willing to publicly communicate even with the radical wing of his own party. Last October, he had received a letter from a Latvian American doctor, complaining about the presence of many Russian-speakers in his native Latvia.
“Latvia is the only country in the world – including Russia – where Russians are marching forward,” Aivars Slucis said in an email published on a Latvian news web site this week. Slucis noted that as a doctor, he cannot return to Latvia because “I wouldn’t be able to treat Russians and Latvians equally in Latvia, which is not allowed. This is why I’m waiting.”
Kristovskis wrote a complete answer, filled with polite agreements. The letter began with words “I agree with your vision and evaluation” of the situation. The correspondence was made public yesterday after the parliament voted on a new government, effectively appointing Kristovskis a new foreign minister. Today, the opposition for calling for his dismissal. The opposition has called him a xenophobe who would not be a good candidate to represent Latvia internationally. When he arrived to the parliament this morning, he seemed nervous. Maybe it was because he was running; maybe for some other reason, but his hands were shaking as he read out loud passages from the email exchange. His political ambitions and sheer sloppiness got the best of him. He seemingly desires to be liked by everyone, including the members of his party so much so that he is unwilling to ignore anyone, including the most radical people in his party – the Civic Union.
For the Civic Union, the politics is a balancing act between the somber silent reasonable minority and the loud controversial majority. The current government would be wise to watch every step, double-check every move as it enjoys a mere slim majority in the 100-member parliament. It doesn’t bode well for Latvia’s political stability.
Update: The Mayo Clinic in the United States has launched an investigation into Dr. Slucis’ letter to Krisotvskis, written from Slucis’ work e-mail account.
Nov 03
AleksDoesn't Fit Anywhere Else
RIGA – 
This web site went down some time during the weekend. For some unknown reason. Thankfully, all database information was stored in a safe place. And thankfully, I was able to recover all of it and re-install the software along with all of the articles. I didn’t have as much time to devote to this blog’s recovery effort as I would have liked. But for now at least, everything appears to be back to normal.
Sorry for the inconvenience the blackout has caused.
Older Entries
RSS
Recent Comments