Palaces and monuments after the Soviet occupation are also at risk of being demolished or rebuilt. A new law also forces the Latvian Orthodox Church to cut ties with the Russian Orthodox Church.
According to SVT’s Europe Correspondent, Christoffer Wendick, the war in Ukraine became a golden opportunity for the country’s politicians to start dismantling the Soviet legacy – something they wanted to do for a long time.
– Everything connected to Moscow or Russia has become somewhat threatening, he says.
Russian speakers’ view of the war possible cause
What can also explain why the rulers chose to cut ties with Russia has to do with a survey from last spring that shows that 20 percent of the Russian speakers in the country have a positive attitude towards President Vladimir Putin. That is the opinion of the Latvian political scientist Juris Rozenvalds.
– They saw this as a risk, he says.
Consequences when language is washed away
Despite the fact that a third of Latvia’s population belongs to the Russian minority, the country’s only official language is Latvian. Russian-speaking Karina sees consequences with the fact that Russian is now being washed away.
– If you tell people they are the wrong kind of people, you can’t expect them to stand up, protect and respect you if something happens. We are all in the same boat, she says and continues:
– I don’t want to change anything in my life just because someone has decided that you can’t speak Russian here for a long time.
Hear Karina tell more about how the Russian language is limited in the clip above.