Latvia preaches 'pragmatism' after Russian election

RIGA - The temperature in bilateral relations between Russia and Latvia may have reached volcanic levels, but Latvian officials are playing it cool in the wake of President Vladimir Putin's election on March 26.

Putin captured a slight majority of the vote, including 54 percent of the 10,500 Russian citizens in Latvia who participated in the election.

He was elected at a time when Russian nationalists have increased their threats and actions against Latvia.

In the last month, the Latvian Embassy in Moscow was vandalized, a Russian extremist threatened to kidnap the Latvian Ambassador to Russia, and protests were held to push for the freedom of convicted Soviet war criminal Vasily Kononov.

"We have a hope that the next Russian president and the next Russian policy will be more pragmatic," said Aivars Groza, foreign policy adviser to Prime Minister Andris Skele.

Groza and Minister of Foreign Affairs Indulis Berzins both seized on the idea of "pragmatism" to define their future relations with Russia.

"Like [I did] previously, I can voice a hope that pragmatism and dialogue with the West, the European Union and NATO will determine Russia's foreign policy and it will be based on pragmatic actions," Berzins told Baltic News Service on March 27.

He said Latvia wants good neighborly relations with Russia and hopes these relations will be based on internationally accepted norms.

"At the end, when the elections are completed, I would like to know what the policy of Vladimir Putin will be and his foreign policy as well," Berzins told LETA.

Said Groza in agreement: "We don't have the official policy program of Putin and the new Russian government."

Berzins said it's important that Russia will support regional relations, over-border cooperation, and cooperate with the 10 other countries that border the Baltic sea.

He told BNS that if Russia can accept that the Baltic states belong to the West then relations could be sufficiently good. However, the Russian Embassy deflected the idea that its new president had failed to provide a policy platform.

"The newly elected Russian President Vladimir Putin has been at the helm of Russia for quite enough time so that our partners abroad would realize that under his leadership the Russian Federation continues to strive for building constructive international relations on the basis of real mutual understanding and respect for the interests and concerns of each other, both in the economic and political spheres," said Vladimir Ivanov, the Russian Embassy's press secretary.

Groza dismissed any notion that the Latvian government felt threatened by events like the damage done to its embassy in Moscow: "This was not official Russian policy."

He denied there were fears about the threat made by an Russian extremist group to kidnap the Latvian Ambassador in exchange for Vasily Kononov.

"We don't see this as a serious threat," said Groza. "The official policy of the embassy in Riga was not to take the threat seriously."

Yet the Russian Duma is currently considering imposing economic sanctions against Latvia, a decision which should be made by the end of March. Ivanov offered a none too subtle hint about why the sanctions could be imposed by President Putin's incoming government.

"As to the relations with Latvia, the barriers that prevent their development [mutual understanding and respect] are well-known. They have been initially created not by Russia," he said. "With due practical steps of the Latvian side towards taking into consideration Russia's concern, especially in the field of national minority rights, there could be good prospects for our relations."