Analytics, Baltic States – CIS, Direct Speech, Latvia, Legislation

Sokolovs believes that Russian-speakers are a great resource. "Of course, one may mistrust non-Latvians to a greater or lesser extent, but this mistrust must no go too far, or finding a way back will be difficult. Declaring Russian a foreign language, shutting down Russian schools all pose threat to integration, which has become sufficiently effective over the past 25 years," believes Sokolovs.

In Sokolovs' opinion, non-citizens should have the right to vote in local government elections. On the other hand, only citizens should have the right to be elected to a local government.

Sokolovs indicated that his Association of Citizens and Non-citizens had done very much since 1998 to foster naturalization. The remaining 260,000 non-citizens will never become naturalized citizens, for various reasons. "For some, this is more convenient as they want to continue to travel to Russia without a visa, while others feel offended that they have not been granted Latvian citizenship automatically. However, the question of involving non-citizens in common life still remains," said Sokolovs. "It is a duty of politicians to give people the opportunity to be involved in common life, so it would depend on a given individual whether he will use this opportunity or not."

Sokolovs does not deny that the Russian Embassy in Latvia offers support for various Russian culture events in Latvia. For instance, Russian Culture Days have been organized in Latvia very successfully for the past five years. Financial support for organization of the event had also been requested from the State Cultural Capital Foundation, but it was turned down. "I have impression that financial support is only provided for Latvian culture. But when we request funds for our cultural events from the Russian Embassy, we are being called the hand of Moscow."

Asked whether Russia is currently an ally or an enemy of Latvia, Sokolovs admitted that Russia today was not an ally to Latvia, yet not an enemy either. "The fact that Russia may be perceived as an enemy by the Latvian government also concerns the local Russian-speakers, as they are often considered to be not loyal to Latvia," believes Sokolovs.

While security of Latvia is guaranteed by Article 5 of the NATO treaty, Latvian politicians should not say provocative things about Russia, he added. Sokolovs is nevertheless confident that Donbas developments would be impossible in Latvia, as no one here would want something like this to happen.

"The uncertain status of the Russian language, Russian schools, non-citizens' aloofness from common life and inability to influence local governments' work – all of that concerns non-Latvians. It is time we overcame the illusion of "national romanticism", that there is just one language, one culture in the country. We have to accept the reality, that the population of Latvia is multi-ethnic," said Sokolovs.