Integration and Minority Information Service: newsletter of 7 April 2009

Today news:

 SS legionaries as the topic for the European Parliament elections

Telegraf reports that Baltic Russian youth conference took place in Riga. The main question of the conference was: „Who we are - Russian youth in the Baltic countries?” One of the main conclusions of the conference: there is no contradiction between acknowledgment of one’s relation to Russia and acknowledgment of one’s relation to the citizenship of the European Union. This gives Russian-speaking youth great opportunities

Vesti Segodnya reports that Lithuania expressed its will to participate as a third party in the appeal process launched by Latvia in the case of “Kononov v. Latvia” in the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). Lithuanian government wants to present its own remarks concerning evaluation of legal and historical aspects of the Second World War for the Baltic States. As reported, Latvia appealed the ECHR judgment in the case “Kononov v. Latvia” which established that Latvia violated Article 7 (no punishment without law) of the European Convention on Human Rights and awarded Kononov 30 000 Euros in respect of non-pecuniary damage.

Vesti Segodnya also reports that political party „Everything for Latvia” as part of the EP election campaign will request to exonerate Latvian and Estonian SS legionaries at the European level. The newspaper anticipates that most likely this party will not be elected to the European Parliament.

For further information:

Latvian Centre for Human Rights