6318
#10
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2002
From: Pauls Raudseps <pauls.r@diena.lv>
Subject: re 6316-Russian Rights Denied
Just a short note with regards to the strana.ru (Russian Rights Denied by Baltic and Asian State "Repression") article included in JRL #6316.
Russia has historically (and more often than not hypocritically) used the issue of "minority rights" to interfere in the affairs of its neighbors (compare Catherine the Great's defense of the rights of the Orthodox in Poland in the run-up to the Partitions with her secularization of the church's landholdings in Russia itself). I am not about to launch into a long discourse on this issue with regard to the Baltic States - your readers are undoubtedly familiar with the issue. Nevertheless, it should be pointed out that the strana.ru article contains two eminently misleading statements which can apparently be attributed to Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Yakovenko.
1) After observing that, with regard to Latvia's treatment of the Russian-speaking minority, "evidence of bad behavior was said to be mounting", the article states that "this was confirmed by rulings of the European Human Rights Court at Strasbourg in the case of Tatiana Slivenko over violation of travel rights and infringement of "respect for personal and family life."
In fact the Court has refused to hear 8 of the 11 complaints lodged by Ms. Slivenko and her family, including one regarding a decision by the Latvian authorities that Ms. Slivenko's husband had to leave Latvia in accordance with the 1994 treaty on the withdrawal of the Russian army from Latvia. A verdict on the remaining three complaints is still pending, so in fact up to now the Court has not taken any decisions that could be used as proof of bad behavior on Latvia's part.
2) The article next states that "Ingrida Podkolzina was denied the right to run in parliamentary elections on the pretext of poor knowledge of the Latvian language," creating the impression that the European Human Rights Court found this restriction to be impermissible. In fact, in its ruling in the Podkolzina case the Court explicitly recognized Latvia's right to make knowledge of Latvian a prerequisite for being elected to Parliament. (The decision in full can be read (unfortunately, only in French) at: http://hudoc.echr.coe.int/hudoc/ViewRoot.asp?Item=0&Action=Html&X=619193509& Notice=0&Noticemode=&RelatedMode=1
But even if you disagree with the Court and think that such restrictions are not warranted, the fact that this requirement for being elected to Parliament has since been removed from the law only further underlines the misleading nature of this "evidence".
So, all in all, these two cases hardly qualify as confirmation of "mounting bad behavior". Which, of course, is not to say that there aren't any issues to be dealt with in order to promote the integration of Latvian society. However, misleading pronouncements by the Russian Foreign Ministry are, as diplomats like to say, "counterproductive."
Pauls Raudseps
Editorial Page Editor
Diena
Riga, Latvia
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