From me ?
Maybe a picture of Russian heroes killed by evil Chechen terrorists ?
:-((((((
Posted on 03/27/2005 10:41:36 PM PST by jb6
In a park in the Latvian capital Riga, a small group of protesters gathers, all Russian, some wearing paper hats inscribed with the word "Alien". Latvian police carry out a small, bureaucratic piece of harassment. With a tape, and much officiousness, they measure the distance between the demonstrators and the nearest public building, a school on the other side of the road.
The protest is two metres too close, so the police move it a little further down the path.
The protesters don't mind. They are there to object to a much greater injustice.
More than 450,000 Russians and native Russian-speakers - out of a total Latvian population of 2.3m - are classed as "non-citizens" because they have failed (or refused) to take a test in Latvian language and history, which would allow them to have citizenship.
This was local election day, and they were protesting about the fact that as "aliens", despite having lived in Latvia all their lives, they had no right to take part in the elections - whereas citizens of other EU countries could vote if they had lived there for a mere six months.
"I was born here," said one young man. "I pay the same taxes as Latvians. Yet I'm not allowed to vote for the politicians who spend those taxes."
"I'm here to protest against the government's policy of dividing society along ethnic lines," said another.
The fate of the non-citizens - who account for 20% of the entire population of Latvia - is a complex one.
Soviet migrants
When Latvia gained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, it granted automatic citizenship to those who had lived in the first independent Latvian state - between 1918 and 1940 - but not to those who immigrated here after the war, when Latvia was occupied by the Soviet Union.
Latvia suffered hugely under Soviet rule.
Thousands were arrested and sent to Siberian labour camps, or executed, during the Stalin years.
MEP Tatjana Zdanoka uses her position to highlight the issue Later, hundreds of thousands of Russians, Belarussians and Ukrainians flooded into the republic under a deliberate policy of Russification. The Latvian language was squeezed out of official use.
Latvians were resentful citizens of the USSR. By 1991, they comprised only half of the population of their own country, while in Riga only a third were Latvian.
Even today, Russian is heard as commonly as Latvian on the streets of Riga.
But the government is determined to revive the Latvian identity. It says its policy towards Russians who immigrated here during the Soviet period is aimed not at punishing them for the sins of the Soviet regime (as some suspect) but at ensuring that they learn Latvian and integrate fully into society.
In order to naturalise, Russians must take a test in Latvian, and pass an exam about Latvian history - in which they must "correctly" answer that the country was occupied and colonised, not liberated, by the Soviet Union in 1945.
Many of the Russians at the demonstration on election day said they found that psychologically difficult. They said they wanted to integrate (and many could speak Latvian), but they found the idea of applying for citizenship humiliating.
"I lived here - same as them - and I was a citizen of the USSR," said a middle-aged woman. "They deprived me of my citizenship, and now I must apply to become one! I just won't do it."
Separate, but together
Tatjana Zdanoka is Latvia's only Russian member of the European Parliament and uses her position to publicise the position of the Russian minority.
She says her mother, who has lived in Latvia for 60 years and worked here for 45 years as a schoolteacher, has no right to vote.
"She is 83 and has bad eyes. Of course she's not capable of taking any kind of exam."
Facts about Latvia Latvia was independent from 1918 to 1939 After World War II it was a part of the USSR It regained independence in 1991 700,000 Soviet-time migrants and their children became non-citizens By the time Latvia joined the EU in 2004, this figure had dropped to around 450,000 Latvia's total population is 2,3m (including non-citizens)
Igor Vatolin, a journalist on the newspaper Chas and a Russian rights activist, said the Latvian Popular Front, which led the fight for independence at the end of the 1980s, promised citizenship to everyone living in the republic.
"But they reneged on that - even though thousands of Russians voted with them in favour of independence in the referendum of 1991," he said.
There is no ethnic strife in the streets of Latvia. The two peoples live peacefully together. But politicians on both sides, and in Russia itself, stir things up.
Moscow rarely misses a chance to complain at international meetings of Latvia's "human rights abuses", while the head of the Latvian parliament's foreign affairs committee, Aleksandrs Kirsteins, has described the non-citizens as "civilian occupiers".
He called for an agreement with the Russian government under which all the unwanted foreigners would be herded on to trains and shipped back to their "ethnic homeland" - with a brass band playing on the platform to see them off.
Latvia's two communities deserve credit for by and large ignoring such provocative statements. Despite the bitterness and insecurity on both sides, they have succeeded in forging a peaceful co-existence - somewhat separate, but together.
Maybe, but that's a separate issues. We're not talking about immigrants when we're discussing Russians in Latvia.
It is not a conservative position that American-born citizens of Middle-Eastern descent have to prove their citizenship any more than any other American.
Furthermore, where would one expel a native-born American to?
Whatever you say, tovarisch.
It is with fear and trepidation that I enter this discussion, I don't really have a dog in this fight, the only Russians I've known I liked, and I don't know any Latvians.
But this is a problem that is unique to a country that has been under occupation and has regained its independence. If and when Tibet regains its independence, they are going to face the same problem. While they have a rather large land mass, they are a very small population, and China has aggressively populated Tibet with Chinese settlers. If Tibet (in this rather unlikely scenario) grants them citizenship, they risk being swamped by people who do not see themselves as Tibetan, came uninvited, and are not likely to become Tibetan.
It would make sense in this case to offer citizenship only to those Chinese who wanted to be Tibetan.
This is not quite the same as in Latvia, where the Russians are still a minority, and have already voted with their feet (in a sense) not to return to Russia.
In the Tibetan case, Chinese settlers will eventually be a majority, and to grant them citizenship would finish Tibet as a nation. So how do you handle it? (Not that Tibet is likely ever to be independent again).
Israel had the problem of what to do with Arabs living among them, who were potentially an enemy nation. They opted to grant them citizenship, and (aside from a few problems over the years) it has worked out. They do learn Hebrew and they do take part in the political process.
But Israeli arabs are a distinct minority. Israel adamently refuses to accept any other arab "returnees" as part of the peace process, as (in a democracy) to permit anything approaching an arab majority would finish them as a nation. So there is a natural tension between the republican requirement of individual citizenship and the requirements of nationhood for a people. I don't think its an easy answer.
But if Latvia belongs to the EU, they have already chosen to subsume themselves into something beyond Latvia. By their own logic, they have given up their reason to exclude Russians. And Russians among them who might have preferred to remain Russian have a powerful reason to want Latvian citizenship which will give them EU citizenship at the same time.
Why ? Because some of those Russians were borne in Latvia ? I wasn't talking only about Muslim immigrants - the second generation born in France or Germany is often less assimilated than their parents.
I see you are back to attacking the poster rather then debating points you are loosing, as usual.
In your opinion, how many generations does someone's family have to live in a country before they can no longer be expelled from the nation of their birth?
His arguments can't be taken be taken seriously because of his well-known bigotry against people of the Baltic races.
What are you talking about, boy ?
How many generations ? It's not about generations or race, It's about mentality - If some people don't want to learn native language it means that they don't respect the host nation and that's why should leave.
Yup, what one should expect.
If they're born there it's not a host land but a birth land. Should the Germans demand then that the Poles leave Selasia which was German as far back as 1600 years ago?
I guess you didn't bother to read the article, which flatly states they do speak the language.
When they break a law they will be treated as criminals. You really don't get the point of America, that's obvious.
If they're so confident in the Latvian language, why don't they simply take the test and have done with it. Keep in mind, under Soviet rule, Russian was the lingua franca in the Baltics and it was the native languages that were de-emphasised.
Second, are you suggesting that it is acceptable that there are enclaves in America of people who refuse to learn the langauge and customs of the country? THat would come as news to me considering the reaction I've seen here after September 11th. But please, do elaborate on your defence of having an Islamic anti-American enclave in America, when your hero won't tolerate the same in Russia.
Ivan
And you accuse me of libel? Please point out where I have made any bigoted statements against people from the Baltic countries. You can't, because you are a liar.
That is not an attitude compatible with a free society, "boy."
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