Flashpoints fail to ignite

  • 2007-09-10
  • By TBT staff and wire reports

RUSSIAN RIGHTS: Police and media were more numerous than protestors (Photo: Mike Collier)

RIGA - Police enjoyed a busy evening in Riga Sep. 8 with two potential flashpoints close to each other in the city centre occupying their attention.

From 5 to 6 p.m. a crowd of Russian-speaking protestors gathered in Esplanade park, led by local activist Jevgenijs Osipovs. Waving flags and unfurling Russian-langiage banners reading "Official language status for the Russian language" and "Russians - God is with us!" they voiced their anger at the ban imposed by a Riga court on the so-called 'Russian March' they had hoped to stage on the same day.

As well as Osipovs, politician Vladimirs Buzajevs from the leftist alliance For Human Rights in United Latvia (PCTVL) was among the participants.

Buzajevs delivered an emotional speech calling on the Russian-speaking population to be aware of their rights and fight to protect them. "We are fighting for Latvia and not representing just one nationality, but the nation in general," he said.

Osipovs said that they had not come to fight but to unite Latvians and Russians.

There were far fewer attendees than had been predicted by some Russian news sources, with local and international media easily outnumbering the approximately 100 demonstrators, some of whom sported home made military-style uniforms. A member of the public wearing a T-shirt with the image of Osama bin Laden briefly tried to stir things up, but with riot police looking on, the crowd dispersed peacefully, allowing the police to turn their attention to the hundreds of curious Northern Ireland soccer fans who were already streaming past on their way to Skonto stadium to watch their team play agianst the Latvian national side.

Earlier in the day, the Northern Ireland fans had turned the center of Riga green, setting up camp in the Old Town and downing prodigious quantities of beer while singing their songs, prior to their team's Euro 2008 qualifying match against Latvia. A few minor scuffles broke out but early reports of "rioting" fans from the night before were greatly exaggerated. Five people were arrested on Friday night 's including one Latvian 's and a police car was damaged.

Fears that trouble might escalate after the Northern Ireland team suffered a surprise 1:0 defeat to a Latvian team playng for nothing but pride proved groundless. Police spokeswoman Ieva Reksna told the Baltic News Service that the fans there was no disorder in the city on Saturday night. Three drunk fans were taken to a 'sobering house' and another was detained for his own safety as he was incapable of giving police his details and no information could be found about him.

A total of 12 fines were imposed throughout the city, mainly for being in a public place with an open bottle of alcohol.