The Speaker of the Russian Parliament portrays the Baltic states as “puppets of Washington and Brussels” / Article

Latvian Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkēvičs (“New Unity”) announced this week that from February 24, Latvia will lower the level of its diplomatic representation in Russia to the level of an authorized charge sheet.

Volodins claims that cooperation with the Baltic states is not possible because they have lost their sovereignty.

“The leaders of the Baltic states have been saying for 30 years that they are building independent states. In fact, all decisions are made in Washington and Brussels. Sovereignty has been lost,” Volodin claims.

“People’s interests are being ignored. The population has decreased by an average of a quarter (in Latvia by 30.5%, in Lithuania by 28.4%, in Estonia by 15.4%). Only a third of the citizens actually live in the Baltics, the majority have gone to European countries for profit. Economics the indicators are the worst in the European Union,” Volodins tries to present such a pessimistic picture of living conditions in the Baltic States.

“The only thing where the ruling regimes in these countries have succeeded is Russophobia. Representatives of the local leadership are competing to be the strongest against Russia,” claims Volodin.

“Human rights are violated more than anywhere else in the Baltic states: minorities are oppressed, native languages ​​are forbidden, independent journalists and human rights defenders are persecuted,” writes Volodinwho is one of the most active supporters of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

He is thus jointly responsible for Russia’s criminal invasion of Ukraine, which has been ongoing for almost a year and has killed tens of thousands of civilians.

For years now, Russian propaganda has been purposefully trying to portray Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia as failed countries, where chaos and economic decline reign after the collapse of the USSR.

However, in most public welfare and economic indicators, the Baltic states are well ahead of Russia. For instance, according to the World Bank In Russia, the gross domestic product is 12,195 dollars per inhabitant, while in Latvia the corresponding indicator is 21,148 dollars per inhabitant (2021 data).

In Russia, the average gross salary in September was 61,879 rubles (about 900 euros at the official exchange rate) before taxes, while in Latvia the corresponding figure was 1,369 euros (before taxes).

According to the data of the World Bank, the average life expectancy of newborns in Latvia is 75.4 years, while in Russia it is 71.3 years.

CONTEXT:

Latvian Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkēvičs (“New Unity”) announced this week that Latvia from February 24 will lower the level of diplomatic representation in Russia to the level of authorized clerk, accordingly requiring Russia to act similarly.

This means that the Russian ambassador Mihail Vanin will have to leave Latvia, and the Latvian ambassador in Moscow, Māris Riekstiņš, will have to leave Russia.

Rinkevičs explained his decision by the fact that Russia’s aggression against Ukraine still continues. In this way, Latvia is already showing solidarity with Estonia, whose ambassador in Moscow on Monday demanded to leave the country.

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