In order to provide deeper insight into the life of Latvia's Jews, director Andris Gauja is planning to shoot a documentary about the Jewish community. One of the most important questions the film will attempt to answer is how the community manages to preserve its cultural and religious traditions. An integration-promoting grant program of PHARE will fund the documentary. The film, with an estimated cost of 104,098 euros, is scheduled for completion in 2006. It will be distributed in DVD and VHS to all of Latvia's schools and universities and will be shown on television.
The European Commission has announced a new competition for the head of its Riga office. A previous contest was apparently won by former Integration Minister Nils Muiznieks, but was inexplicably blocked. Applications can be submitted until Nov. 21. Latvia is not the only new EU member state without a chief of delegation, according to the Riga office. Estonia and the Czech Republic will also hold another competition.
Justice Minister Solvita Aboltina withdrew amendments to the citizenship law, saying she feared the issue would become too politicized in the run-up to next year's parliamentary elections. "Some political forces have already taken radical positions regarding the issue of citizenship," Aboltina said. The proposed amendments would likely have included a "loyalty" clause, an area some right-wing parties wanted to expand. For Fatherland and Freedom proposed calling a temporary halt to naturalization as well as including criteria that would allow the state to strip citizenship from people who have shown themselves to be "disloyal" to the country.
Prime Minister Aigars Kalvitis said it was not necessary to amend the Constitution in order to ban same-sex marriages in Latvia. During a TV interview, the prime minister pointed out that other laws already define marriage as a union between a man and woman, therefore amendments to the Constitution are unnecessary. "None [of the Latvian laws] permit same-sex marriages, and they will not be allowed," he said.
