RIGA - Interior Minister Eriks Jekabsons' surprise resignation on Oct. 19 has shaken the coalition and set off a wave of conspiracy theories connecting him with billionaire Boris Berezovsky. But an investigation by the country's secret service concerning the alleged transfer of classified information may carry more serious implications.
After a national security council meeting that barred Berezovsky from future travel to Latvia, Jekabsons announced his resignation. It was carried out a day later. In an interview with Latvian television, Berezovsky said he knew that Jekabsons, who has opposed blacklisting the former oligarch, did not change his position and assailed the arguments of Prime Minister Aigars Kalvitis.
Immediately afterwards, questions arose over how Berezovsky knew what was said in the council's closed and secret meetings. Kalvitis blamed Jekabsons and called for an investigation by the country's secret service. A parliamentary committee will also examine the issue.
"It is necessary to find out whether Jekabsons had called Berezovsky after the [Security Council] session," Kalvitis said in a radio intervie picked up by RIA-Novosti. "Given that Berezovsky immediately called me a liar, I have grounds to believe that he knew the arguments I had put forward when proposing he be blacklisted," the prime minister added.
Jekabsons, however, denied the charge, replying "Of course not," when asked if he divulged information to Berezovsky about what was said during the national security meeting. Jekabsons told The Baltic Times that Kalvitis' interest in barring Berezovsky from traveling to Latvia was "political." He added that President Vaira Vike-Freiberga's position was motivated by her desire to head the UN after current Secretary General Kofi Annan's term expires. She would need Russian support to get the position, the former interior minister added, mentioning her invitation to the Russian patriarch as another move that may please the Kremlin. Jekabsons said the country was under heavy pressure from Moscow to blacklist Berezovsky.
The relationship between the president and the interior minister has at times been rocky. However, her heated criticism of Jekabsons earlier this month, over the country's sluggish pace in meeting the Schengen criteria, was unusual.
How close is the former kickboxing priest-turned-top cop with Berezovsky? They did meet during his first visit to the country, although Jekabsons denied it at the time. He may also have met the former oligarch during a trip to London.
"I have met with Berezovsky, and it doesn't matter how many times, I met with him as an individual," Jekabsons said at a press conference after announcing his resignation.
Jekabsons was not the only one at the meeting who could have called Berezovsky. As Diena op-ed writer Aivars Ozolins wrote in his Oct. 22 column, Parliamentarian Speaker Ingrida Udre and Indulis Emsis both of the Greens and Farmers Union were also present. Diena, the country's paper of record, has pointed to Ilona Lice, Jekabsons head of office, as the common thread tying together Berezovsky, Jekabsons, Ingrida Udre, and Indulis Emsis in a possible web of conspiracy.
Lice worked for Udre and Emsis in the past, dealing with the press and public relations work. Udre has also met with Berezovksy during his first visit to Latvia. Lice's husband, Roberts, was waiting at the airport as Berezovsky arrived last month, and the couple has considerable real estate interests. Lice's tenure at the ministry ended as abruptly as Jekabsons.
In addition to the investigation by the Constitutional Protection Bureau, a parliamentary committee will also examine whether a leak of classified information was made.
"It rather looks like we have an orchestrated event here," Emsis, head of Parliament's national security committee said on Latvian television Oct. 24. He has downplayed any threat that Berezovsky poses to the country. In what has become a widely repeated statement, Emsis said Berezovsky had as much to do with the country's national security as the number of dead goats in the town of Allazi.
