News

Sveiki!

Happy Thanksgiving to all you here in the States! Our last mailer, Oct 30, went out quite late and doesn't seem to have left our mail server, so we'll try and straighten out our mail problems over the next week or so to insure consistent delivery!

We hope you had a chance to participate in November 18th celebration events as well, on Latvia's original (and some contend only) independence day.

This mailer will just be catching up on the news:

Hopefully we'll straighten out our mail problems soon! This and the previous mailer should be archived on our web site by the weekend. We hope you AOL'ers can join us for Lat Chat Sunday.

Ar visu labu,

Silvija Peters

  News

U.S. House endorses future NATO expansion
Reuters Financial Report Wednesday, 2001. Novembe r7. 20:12:00
Copyright 2001 Reuters Ltd.

    WASHINGTON, Nov 7 (Reuters) — The U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday endorsed a new round of expansion into eastern Europe for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
    On a 372-46 vote, the House backed NATO expansion without naming favorites among a flock of contenders, including Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Romania, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Slovenia.
    NATO, which invited Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic to join in 1997, will decide its next round of expansion at a summit in late 2002.
    Lawmakers said NATO still served a vital purpose in European defense and diplomacy, despite the end of the Cold War and breakup of the Soviet Union. They also praised Russia's recent signals that it would tone down its opposition to further NATO expansion.
    "NATO is a critical institution," said Rep. Doug Bereuter of Nebraska, a Republican who sponsored the measure. "If we didn't have NATO today, we would have to create something like it."
    Critics of the measure, however, questioned the need for further expansion and said NATO had outlived its usefulness. They said expansion would be a slap in the face to Moscow.
    "We should be reinforcing that we are Russia's friends and no longer consider them a threat," said Republican Rep. Dana Rohrabacher of California.
    "NATO accomplished its mission and now it deserves to dissolve," he said.
    The measure also authorizes military financing for several eastern European nations and repeals a law that exempted Slovakia from aid under the NATO Participation Act.
    A similar measure is awaiting action in the Senate.

Woman tries to swipe Prince Charles with flowers
Reuters World Report Thursday, 2001. November 8. 14:09:00
Copyright 2001 Reuters Ltd.

    RIGA, Nov 8 (Reuters) — A young Latvian woman, opposed to military action against Afghanistan, tried to strike Britain's Prince Charles across the face with a bunch of flowers on Thursday, but security guards stopped her in time.
    The heir to the British throne, who is on a tour of Baltic states, approached a group of children after laying a wreath at Latvia's Freedom Monument when the 16-year-old lurched at him and tried to swipe his face with a bunch of carnations, security officials said.
    The incident drew an immediate apology from Latvian President Vaira Vike-Freiberga, who had been with the prince at the Freedom Monument, the president's spokeswoman said.
    She said Prince Charles, on a two-day trip to Latvia after visiting Estonia and Lithuania, had expressed his understanding, the spokeswoman said.
    Police detained Russian-speaking Alina Lebedeva, who now faces criminal charges for threatening the life and health of a foreigner. If charges are filed and she is found guilty she could be sentenced to up to 15 years in prison.
    She comes from Latvia's eastern town of Daugavpils, which Prince Charles was due to visit on Friday.
    "The girl was shouting in Russian that she was angry about ...Afghanistan," the head of the Latvian president's security force told Reuters.
    Around 29 percent of the Latvian population are Russian, most of whom settled there after the Soviet Union absorbed the Baltic states in 1940.

Suspected Nazi War Criminal Dies
AP Online Thursday, 2001. November 8. 20:24:00
Copyright 2001 The Associated Press

    SYDNEY, Australia (AP) — A man suspected of committing war crimes as a guard at a Nazi concentration camp during World War II died Thursday, bringing an end to a lengthy effort to send him to Latvia to for trial.
    Justice Minister Chris Ellison confirmed the death of Konrad Kalejs, 88, who suffered from cancer and Alzheimer's disease, but he did not release the cause of death.
    Kalejs was accused of being a guard at the Salaspils concentration camp in Latvia. That European nation indicted him for allegedly taking part in atrocities during the 1941-44 German occupation when some 80,000 Jews were killed.
    Kalejs denied the allegations.
    He had battled extradition for years. He last appeared in court Oct. 23, when he was wheeled in on a gurney as his lawyers asked a judge to refuse Latvia's extradition request on technical grounds. A magistrate ordered in May that he be extradited.
    Kalejs migrated to Australia in 1950 and took citizenship. He would have been the first Australian citizen extradited to face war crimes charges.

Prince defends carnation assailant
COMTEX Newswire Saturday, 2001. November 10. 10:19:00
Copyright 2001 by United Press International

    LONDON, Nov 10, 2001 (United Press International via COMTEX) — Prince Charles, the Prince of Wales and heir to the British throne, on Saturday defended a teenage protester who attacked him with a bunch of red carnations during a visit to Riga, Latvia, earlier in the week.
    A spokesman for Charles told news media the prince hoped for leniency for Alina Lebedova, 16, who faces a prison sentence of up to 15 years if convicted of the main office, attacking a foreign dignitary.
    She said she hit the prince with the flowers to protest the war in Afghanistan.
    "We hope and trust the Latvian authorities will take this into account when looking into this case," a spokesman said.
    The Daily Express tabloid newspaper said the prince was shocked at the severity of the possible punishment that awaited the schoolgirl, who is being held in police custody in Riga.
    A spokesman for Charles quoted by the Times newspaper said, "We do not want to cause a diplomatic incident, but there is no way we want to see her prosecuted."
    He added, "We do not want to take this seriously at all. As the victim in this, the Prince will be allowed to say what he thinks should happen. At the right time he will say the right thing to do is to take this no further."
    The teenager confronted Charles during a walk in Riga on Thursday. Customary barriers between the visitor and the crowd were not in place as he mingled with the people.
    The comments from the prince's St. James's Palace followed personal appeals for his intervention from the girl's musician parents, Lirisa and Nikolay Lebedova.
    "I want him to say something for her," Nikolay Lebedov told news media. "I don't know why she did it, but 15 years is too harsh."
    Lebedova told news media after the attack, "I'm protesting against Latvia joining NATO and I'm against the war in Afghanistan. Britain is the enemy."

Reuters historical calendar — November 18
Reuters World Report Sunday, 2001. November 11. 11:14:00
Copyright 2001 Reuters Ltd.

    LONDON, Nov 11 (Reuters) — Following are some of the major events to have occurred on November 18 in history: [excerpted]
    1189 — William II, last Norman king of Sicily, died. The throne was taken by his cousin Tancred the Bastard, Count of Lecce.
    1477 — William Caxton produced the first printed book in the English language, "The Dictes and Sayengis of the Phylosophers."
    1918 — The Latvian National Council proclaimed the independent Republic of Latvia, with Janis Cakste as president.
    1928 — Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse made his first appearance at the Colony Theatre in New York in a film called "Steamboat Willie."

European Court to discuss complaint against Latvia
COMTEX Newswire Tuesday, 2001.November 13. 9:01:00
(c) 2001 ITAR-TASS
By Boris Kipkeyev

    MOSCOW, Nov 13, 2001 (Itar-Tass via COMTEX) — The European Court on Human Rights will on November 14 discuss the complaint of Russian citizen Tatyana Slivenko and her family against Latvia. The Slivenko family accuse Riga of violation of human rights and of property rights in Latvia. The complaint has officially been referred to the European Court by Russian commissioner in the European Court of Human Rights Pavel Laptev in June 2001.
    The essence of the complaint is that after Tatyana Slivenko's husband, a Russian, a lieutenant-colonel, retired from the services, the Latvian authorities confiscated their documents, searched their flat in Riga and then decreed that they leave Latvia. The family had to move to Kursk. The Slivenko's now have no opportunity to stay in Riga even for a brief period of time to visit their aged parents.
    In an interview to Tass, Laptev said that the Slivenko case is the first international case when Russia acts in the capacity of "a third party to protect the rights of its citizen". This case is a sort of test for handling by the European Court of similar cases on the breach of citizens' rights and property rights in Latvia.
    According to the latest information, the European Court for Human rights has some 20 complaints against Latvia. The plaintiffs are either Russian citizens or ethnic Russians. It is characteristic that the opening of the debating of these complaints, in other words, their recognition in essence, is hampered by the Court's secretariat pending the decision on the Slivenko case.

EU Expansion at a glance
AP WorldStream Tuesday, 2001. November 13. 10:59:00
Copyright 2001 The Associated Press

    BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP) — The European Union released its annual progress reports Tuesday on the 13 candidates hoping to join the EU in the next few years. Here is a summary of the situation for each country: [excerpted]
    LATVIA — Generally made good progress catching up to front-runners. Good progress on judicial reform and environment protection. EU complains of inflexible labor markets and slow rate of privatization. Urged to maintain fiscal discipline. Greater effort needed to reform agriculture, fight corruption and ensure efficient control of EU funds. Praised for moves to integrate Russian minority.
    — — —
    ESTONIA — Another front-runner, praised for rapid progress reforming economy, overhauling legal system and modernizing public administration. EU welcomes advances integrating the sizable Russian minority. Fast growth and reforms show economy nearly ready to compete in EU's open market. Needs to work on fighting organized crime and improving food safety standards.
    — — —
    LITHUANIA — Catching up after slow start. Economy should be able to cope soon with life in EU free market. Praised for privatizing banking sector, strengthening anti-corruption controls, improved transport safety standards. Warned administrative capacity to handle demands of EU membership remain "fragile." Needs to push ahead with agricultural reforms, liberalize labor markets and reform pensions. Must close Ignalina nuclear power plant.

Percy Ross
AP US & World Tuesday, 2001. November 13. 17:48:00
Copyright 2001 The Associated Press
By KARREN MILLS
Associated Press Writer

    MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Percy Ross, the millionaire-turned-philanthropist who doled out cash to readers of his syndicated column for more than 16 years, has died at age 84.
    Ross, who died Saturday at his home, was best known for his newspaper column "Thanks a Million," through which he gave out millions of dollars worldwide.
    Ross closed his wallet when he ended the column in September 1999. He estimated he had handed out as much as $30 million.
    "I've achieved my goal. I've given it all away," Ross told readers in his farewell column. "You've given me so much over the years. In many respects, I'm far richer today than when I started."
    The column ran in about 800 newspapers, from major dailies to tiny weeklies. Through it and other philanthropy, Ross helped pay for organ transplants and recreational centers and handed out silver dollars along with his homespun wisdom.
    "He who gives while he lives," he often wrote, "also knows where it goes."
    Ross' editor, Nancy Webber, said he would get 10,000 letters from readers weekly seeking help, offering suggestions or simply saying thank you. Even after the column ended, Ross continued to get up to 2,000 letters a month.
    "The post office would call us every two weeks and say, 'You've got a full bag of mail over here,'" assistant Kurt Jess said Tuesday.
    And Ross occasionally responded to requests, even though the money for philanthropy had run out.
    High school freshman James Haught, of Del Norte, Colo., wrote to Ross last December saying he needed $65 for a school science project. Ross sent $100.
    In 1998, Ross helped Marquette, Mich., raise $3.5 million to build a YMCA, appealing to his readers to send $1 each.
    "We received over $50,000 in $1 bills," YMCA board member Mary Tavernini recalled. "It was just incredible."
    The son of poor immigrants from Latvia and Russia, Ross made his fortune producing plastic film and trash bags.
    After selling his company for $8 million in 1969, he split the money four ways among his wife and two sons.
    Ross used the $2 million he kept for himself, and with subsequent investments established himself as a philanthropist. He launched the column in March 1983.
    In a 1999 interview, Ross said he came up with the column idea after giving away more than 1,000 bicycles at a holiday party for children in Minneapolis in the late 1970s.
    "I fully expected that my health would go long before my wealth," he told readers in his final column. "In my wildest dreams I never expected to have survived nearly 17 years in print."

Latvia's central banker to resign in order to enter politics
AP WorldStream Wednesday, 2001. November 14. 10:15:00
Copyright 2001 The Associated Press

    RIGA, Latvia (AP) — The head of Latvia's central bank said Wednesday he will resign to pursue a political career, leaving the post he has held since the country regained independence as the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991.
    Einars Repse, 39, said he will submit his resignation to Latvia's Saeima parliament by the end of this month "to avoid any appearance of a conflict of interest," said central bank spokesman Kristaps Otersons.
    Repse, one of this Baltic Sea coast nation's most popular public figures, launched a political party in August called "New Time" and began actively raising funds for parliamentary elections slated for late next year.
    As central banker, he gained a reputation as a fiscal conservative and guided Latvia through tough reforms, including the introduction of a new currency to replace the Soviet ruble and through a banking crisis in 1995.
    Two years remain in Repse's current six-year term but the parliament is expected to approve his resignation, which would take effect early next year.
    A possible replacement has not yet been announced.

Foreign Military-Glance
AP US & World Wednesday, 2001. November 14. 16:21:00
Copyright 2001 The Associated Press
By The Associated Press

    Military assistance and financing of arms for allies included in a security aid bill approved Wednesday by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. The first figures reflect 2002 money, the second figures, 2003. [excerpted]
    Foreign Military Financing:
     — Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, a total of $21 million; $23.5 million
     — Jordan, $75 million; $87.5 million
     — Poland, $15 million; $17.5 million

Putin Offers Americans Thoughts on NATO, Bin Laden
Reuters Online Service Friday, 2001. November 16. 0:55:00
Copyright 2001 Reuters Ltd.
By Ron Popeski

    WACO, Texas (Reuters) — Russian President Vladimir Putin told U.S. radio listeners on Thursday that there was nothing Russia could do if more ex-communist countries wanted to join NATO and that he had various blunt ways of describing Osama bin Laden -- but that standards of decency prevented him from uttering them in public.
    In a freewheeling 45-minute interview and phone-in on National Public Radio, Putin also offered some insight into his literary preferences and his passion for judo.
    Putin told a listener from Seattle that he could neither support nor oppose NATO membership for the three former Soviet Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
    "If we change the format of the relationship between Russia and NATO, then I think NATO enlargement will cease to be a relevant issue," Putin said in the broadcast, conducted in New York and heard throughout the country at the end of his three-day visit to the United States.
    "I am not opposed to it, I just don't think it makes any sense if we are to deal with the issue of increasing national security. We, of course, are not in a position to tell people what to do. We cannot forbid people from making certain choices if they want to increase the security of their nations in a certain way."
    After holding talks with President Bush at his Texas ranch, Putin flew to New York to view the ruins of the World Trade Center, destroyed in the Sept. 11 hijacked airliner attacks, and to express fresh solidarity with the United States in its campaign against terrorism.
    Putin in October indicated for the first time that Russia would not oppose further enlargement of NATO if Moscow were involved in the process, and during his U.S. stay he stressed that NATO stood to gain from including Moscow in its decision-making and by treating it as an ally against threats to world security.
    REAGAN "A LITTLE EXTREME"
    He issued his new broadside against bin Laden in response to a question from Virginia over how he felt in the 1980s, when he worked for the KGB, about then-President Ronald Reagan's denunciation of the Soviet Union as an "evil empire."
    "I think he was being a little extreme and that such an attitude was unlikely to accomplish an objective even if his objectives were noble," he said "It was a motto, a slogan of the day rather than a policy pursued by Reagan."
    But Bush's description of bin Laden as "the evil one," he said, was "very mild as a choice of words. I have other ways of putting it but am restrained by the fact that I am talking to the media and this is hardly appropriate. These terrorists do not treat the rest of humanity as human beings. We are not even enemies as far as they are concerned, just dust."
    Putin made only brief references to the failure during his visit to come to an agreement on U.S. plans to build a missile defense shield and withdraw from parts of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty. Bush continued to dismiss the pact as outdated, while Putin said Moscow was still in favor of retaining it.
    The Kremlin leader raised no objections to a Texan listener's suggestion that the United States and Russia might join forces in creating such a shield.
    "The most important thing is to work on a system that rather than generating mutual distrust...engages us in building a system toward the opposite end," he said. "I believe such a scenario is feasible and that's what I feel my partner and colleague President Bush is prepared to do."
    Putin's interview, similar to phone-ins conducted by a Moscow radio station with former President Bill Clinton and other world leaders, also delved into Putin's life outside the Kremlin.
    He told listeners he had started taking part in a Russian form of wrestling at 14 and later graduated to judo, which he still practiced regularly, and repeated his feeling that the sport amounted to a "philosophy." He also listed his favorite classic authors as Russians -- Tolstoy, Chekhov and Gogol.
    He discounted any possibility of foreign mediation to settle Russia's conflict with separatists in Chechnya, saying Russia's own territory was at issue. Political means would be used to find a solution, he said, without elaborating and "terrorists" and foreign mercenaries would be "brought to justice or destroyed."

Latvia launches ad campaign to encourage more Russians to apply for citizenship
AP WorldStream Monday, 2001. November 19. 15:41:00
Copyright 2001 The Associated Press
By J. MICHAEL LYONS
Associated Press Writer

    RIGA, Latvia (AP) — Smiling Russians waving their new Latvian passports in television advertisements on Monday marked the beginning of a nationwide campaign aimed at persuading more of the Russian-speaking minority to apply for citizenship.
    This Baltic former Soviet republic has been sharply criticized by Moscow for alleged discrimination against its 1 million Russian speakers, mostly ethnic Russians, who make up some 40 percent of the 2.4 million population.
    More than half have no citizenship, giving Latvia one of the highest populations of stateless people in Europe. While 350,000 do have citizenship, many of the rest hold Russian passports.
    The European Union, which Latvia wants to join, has encouraged the nation to more actively integrate its Russian-speaking minority and to reduce the number of stateless people -- among the continent's highest.
    "The problems that Latvia faces with stateless persons will become problems of the EU after Latvia becomes a member," head of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Latvia, Peter Semneby, said.
    Most of the Russians immigrated here during 50 years of Soviet rule, which ended in 1991 and the issue has soured bilateral relations.
    Russia has singled out laws making Latvian a requirement of citizenship since most Russians speak little or no Latvian. Residents without citizenship can't vote, can't hold certain jobs and have trouble securing visa to travel abroad.
    TV ads, which began running Monday, show smiling Russians waving their new Latvian passports, saying their lives will be better with citizenship. A blurb flashes at the end of segment saying, "Latvian Citizenship: Make Your Choice."
    "This is a step in addressing the most important issue in Latvia today -- making democracy accessible to everyone," Eizenija Aldermane, the head of Latvia's Naturalization Board, said.
    Latvia's government is the official sponsor of the campaign, drawn up by the Saatchi and Saatchi advertising agency. But Canada, Germany, Great Britain, Norway, Sweden and the United States are footing the dlrs 270,000 bill.
    Critics say Latvia doesn't have its heart in the campaign and is simply going through the motions to appease the EU. Others say that despite their positive tone, the ads won't win over Russians who feel increasingly alienated.
    "It will take more than a few TV ads to convince non-citizens that Latvia is their country and will take care of them," said Boris Tsilevich, one of a half-dozen Russian-speaking members of Latvia's 100-seat parliament.
    Commercials will appear on Russian-language television programs aired in Latvia and full-page ads in Russian-language newspapers and sent in the mail. The campaign is slated to run into early next year.
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