Latvian parliament members approved of the bill, which does not acknowledge non-citizens of Latvia who fought in the Red Army as participants of the Second World War, Baltnews reports.
The Latvian parliament has approved of the ambiguous law About Provision of Status of Second World War Participants in the second reading. According to this law, participants of the Second World War are only Latvians who fought against the Soviet Regime and Fascist Germany and its allies in military divisions of other countries.
This law was initiated by the Parliament Commission for Human Rights and Social Affairs, which proposed to acknowledge the Second World War Participants the citizens of Latvia who had citizenship of this country on June 17, 1940 as well as its permanent residents who legally entered Latvia before this date. This norm, in case it is approved, will not spread on people having arrived in Latvia in accordance with the Agreement about Military Bases dated October 5, 1939.
National Socialistic German Workers’ Party members, representatives of military structures of the Third Reich, collaborationists and USSR KGB officers will not bear the status of the WWII participants. Besides, this draft law emphasizes that Latvia being an occupied country, does not have legal responsibility for military or any other actions on its territory in the period of its occupation.
Questions of social guarantees and privileges for WWII participants will be resolved by the municipal institutions separately.
Russkiy Mir
