Head of the President's Office, Martins Bondars, has decided to quit his job. Presidential foreign affairs advisor Andrejs Pildegovics will replace Bondars on July 1. The media was unable to obtain comments from Bondars but underlined that his resignation had nothing to do with a possible political career. Bondars will leave his position for a job in the private sector, which he hopes will be a positive challenge. He is quitting just a year before the president's term in office expires.
Parliament's anti-corruption committee met with representatives from the Corruption Prevention and Combatting Bureau (KNAB) and Delna, the local branch of Transparency International, to discuss improving control over the use of so-called "black coffers" or unofficial funds of political parties. Committee chairwoman Linda Murniece told the Baltic News Service that the committee wanted to listen to KNAB's proposal about legislative amendments that would help law enforcement agencies control parties, preventing them from using money from their "black coffers." The committee will review the proposals and decide on presenting them before Parliament.
Latvia continues to be a leader in terms of its number of students, as there were 571 students per 10,000 capita at the beginning of the outgoing academic year, according to the Latvian national statistics office. Finland has the largest number of students 's 575 per 10,000 capita 's while Lithuania and Estonia had 570 students and 507 students per 10,000 capita respectively in the academic year of 2004-05. Further down the list are Greece (541 students per 10,000 capita), Poland (535 students) and Slovenia (523). The average EU figure for the academic year of 2003-04 was 379 students per 10,000 capita. The three countries at the bottom of the list are Croatia (284 students), Germany (282 students) and Malta (198 students).
The Latvian Supreme Court upheld the sentence in a criminal case against two young men charged with the murder of an American missionary in Riga in 2004. Last October, the Riga Regional Court found Karlis Magone and Ingus Smitkins guilty of murdering U.S. missionary Drew Rush. The court sentenced Magone to 20 years in prison with confiscation of property and police supervision of three years and Smitkins to 15 years and 10 days in prison and confiscation of property. The full text of the verdict will be available on July 10.
A cemetery of German soldiers killed in World War II has been vandalized in Babite, located just outside Riga. A building at the gates to the cemetery was covered with graffiti and one of its windows smashed. The vandalism took place between May 11 and May 16, yet it was reported to the police only on June 26. Marina Capa, an aide to the Riga County Police Chief, said that, judging by the graffiti, the vandals probably had been teenagers. She said there was nothing criminal about the inscriptions, but police preferred to withhold their contents for now.
