this r.t. moscow in our top stories france tells syria's president his time is up for his chance to bring in reforms and is seeking more pressure on the violence plagued country earlier damascus signal concessions to the arab league's demands by agreeing in principle from the international observers into the country. move towards creating a new trade block to prevent europe's rot from spreading their way present preventive stress to ration economic union won't repeat the mistakes machine countries made when integrating. but there are new signs of within the e.u.

itself tonight as britain clashes with germany over ways out of the debt turmoil chancellor merkel wants countries to surrender more control of her own financial and political decisions which the u.k. fears will be a blow to the state sovereignty. next on r t twenty years after the collapse of the soviet union we continue our look at the past since former states have taken this time we see how life changed in latvia which these days is a member of the european union is coming right. band aid seems blanched music independence day is pomp and fanfare druid's much of any other public holiday in the country on this day the republic's top leaders counted still a flower as the freedom monument in latvia's capsule rigo. informal events like the torch processions are held in the evening of the same day people

who see themselves as the country's true patriots marched through streets closed to traffic for the occasion the first sessions old in eyes by the radical nationalist party known as me or from latvia. however many people don't identify themselves with the festivities they are russian speaking residents who make up nearly forty percent of the country's population half of them have not yet received citizenship rights. lemay lindemann is a columnist for several months in newspapers you'll soon vesta gates cases of public interest and publishes reports on them but even though vladimir holds

a lapse in passports he's technically not a fully fledged citizen of his own country. not because the passport cover bears a unique inscription of that order written in latvian it says your passport of a non-citizen was a reserve was more on the main page in the english translation it reads aliens business hours and sometimes we are called just that aliens like we are from another planet even full of you pointed international law we are treated as such a present there are something like four hundred thousand such people in latvia there's a. man fear became an independent state in one thousand nine hundred one after seceding from the soviet union. barely one month later the country's parliament passed a resolution officially dividing the republic's population into citizens and so-called non-citizens. the latter were denied voting rights they could not be elected to bodies of state or thorson or work in government departments. they supplied to not

only those who settled down in the country after nine hundred forty but their descendants. thank you but i don't want to be a second class person i want to be a citizen of the hunt you are a live thing. any known citizen is free to try to naturalize the vent they need to pass exams on the country's history and show the command of the state language and the national anthem. after submitting over necessary papers applicants then need to wait for about a year before they get a cherished citizens passport. many people fail to go through the procedure that the milliner meant for one was not even allowed to see those exams. for the past five years and i spent three of them outside lot of fear that's why they didn't accept my papers but that excuse was absolutely unlawful. my fight for citizenship

rights were never again there even stage a sit in in this building i spent the day here and refused to leave after office hours when the police force me out of. there was a time when victor durgan off and the third test and valdis samplers a trauma surgeon who worked in the same hospital. now zat loses latvia's president durgan off is a member of latvia's anti fascist committee. most of those are religious they can't bear to see the revival naziism unluckier says i can see it with the naked eye would upset me most of all is that so-called democratic europe closes its eyes to the revival naziism group as a kind word was. on march sixteenth nineteen forty three during the second world war the last in legion was formed. thousands of volunteers

in the country signed up to fight for the nazis. off independence every year on this date legion veterans have been officially commissioned to hold a parade in central region. in two thousand and five big to go off and several other hansie fascists clans and prison rape stood in the way of marching legion and. the police dispersed all the anti fascists and let the s.s. veterans put the flowers at the freedom monument. crosses the. we believe in a free country fascists and their followers have no right to bring flowers to a symbol of the state if the state doesn't see itself as a nationalist we. all still our actions were in line with the united nations resolution calling for resistance to all forces that promote the waffen s.s.

. officers. some fourteen thousand veterans living in latvia today forts in the soviet army during world war two. give kenichi convinced there was a paratrooper event. as he walks to the monument commemorating the soviet soldiers who lost their lives in the war to make sure that nobody sees his medals. a law passed back in one thousand. until one bans the public display of soviet symbols. and the attitude to us is just a bowman about your beatles there was even a case where a uniformed veteran riding on a bus on victory day had to leave because the driver stopped the bus and said he wouldn't budge unless the man's.

the monument to soviet soldiers in riga was blown up in one thousand nine hundred eighty he was later restored to the act and he masterminded by negus. he was sentenced to a brief time in prison. now he's again free to walk about central riga together with his son and openly discuss the fate of the monument. it's a myth some people this is a monument to me it's a disgrace to the latvian nation. the following is nothing that should be simply pulled down to symbolize that we are no longer occupied. but. in the year when a good fish can blow up the monument another event occurred that course the world's attention. former soviet past has done for silly kononov had been brought before a latvian court to face criminal charges face actions in world war two and did it

over the years this is the order of lenin well he gave it to me for blowing up sixteen german trains when i was a partisan krisna traditional. in more than latvia the x. parties and was declared an enemy and spent almost two years behind bars for taking part in the killing of local volunteers they were helping the germans. kannan of was acting on of the situation taken by parties and tribunals in one nine hundred forty three. when radical nationalists came to power after the regime change their lackeys started a massive campaign against entire fascists of people who had fought in the entire hitler coalition they were all to review the old can of the war edition in order to whitewash naziism and fascism as usual for she is a. ivers garda is leader of a political organization called the national front of latvia the front publishes

a newspaper founded by him. that's weekends and during public holidays volunteers hand out free copies to anyone willing to read the paper. its name contains three deeds they stand for de occupation the call in isolation and the russification. for a long time talk to god towards ethics at the academy of culture some of his former students a regular contributors to the newspaper. now under their chief editors guidance they spend no effort in a bid to oppose what they call russian dominance in latvia. the ethnic lot of ins make up fifty percent of the population of their own country and the other fifty percent occupies backs my russian. police it's necessary to create uncountable conditions for them but we need a situation where latvian society rejects occupiers moreover we need

a law on the call is asian we must say to each of them we give you a deadline to get out of year olds. cameron north of british filmmaker decided to make a personal investigation into the into ethnic relations between russians and that fiends. in short a documentary called latvia in hitler's footsteps way draws uncomfortable parallels between present day latvia and nazi germany. during the second of the second. they must go. it was a diversion but there must be a rather. i'm on board for. some things it would like to say this national state and that be the languages of the things they have that you're to speak latvian things about and some rights in latvia if you're not

a citizen. some six of the drops in the coalition things where you are discriminated against because you're in pure. beauty alex sanz mother is latvian but his father is russian he has a perfect command of both languages he received an excellent education both as an engineer and as a journalist his son misha aiel is a school pupil. papa tell me what percent means. is often a loss when he tries to figure out his math textbook it's written in math feehan. the internet translator says it means headline well yes that's a possibility. but countries schools were formed in the middle of the past decade. russian textbooks were hastily replaced with latvian ones now more than half of the

subjects in russian language schools are supposed to be taught in latvian. whenever russians aitches with the ball command of the levy languish cordon teach such difficult subjects mathematics physics and chemistry work to russian schoolchildren it brings misery was abuzz teachers and students within it from within or to new people. in the course of education reform nearly all old textbooks were revised and many russian language schools closed down numerous protest acts had no effect the decisions of latvia's education ministry were fine. so far inspectors haven't shown up in many russian schools and all subjects are still taught in russian. math fin language textbooks approved by the education ministry can be seen in full view but they are only for show.

miller shook off is the first russian mayor of riga since independence twenty years ago he too had to close schools down including schools for russian speaking students but it didn't lead to any actions of protest in that instance schools were shut soley for economic all round the demographic reasons half of the classrooms in one third of all schools had no peoples. and were given a good opening why was so many of the decisions taken by the previous mayor were largely politically motivated just that was the basis for decisions about whether schools should be closed down walls i mean when we merge schools we make a great deal of effort to accommodate all the children in the new building of city we also do all we can to retain jobs for the teachers always most but in the old days they just closed schools down and that was last year was the previous and. the fact that the russian was elected mayor of the latvian capital in the summer of two

thousand and nine surprise many politicians analysts put it down into the economic crisis. those who had felt it. severe impact we're not taking as much notes of the nationality of a politician as they used to. mr wu were if in the early one nine hundred ninety s. they have not made the mistake of dividing the people into citizens of unknown citizens the group of the politicians would have been compelled to talk about the economy social issues and structural reforms instead of harping on the theme of latvians and russians every two or four years we were much and we would have been able to deal with pressing issues much earlier and much more efficiently or put still have to contend with economic issues corruption and many other things. despite its small size there was schools of major industrial plants in soviet latvia. three of them which employ between ten and fifteen thousand workers each

specialized in electronics. another one made minivans which were used as ambulances throughout the soviet union. today their production line stand idle. factory workers an engineer is going to small business. grant vs highly skilled professionals have left the country in search of a job. cashers that so much i am critical of right out of the year and a g.o.p. race for the white house and foreign policy front runners for the republican presidential nomination have made it clear that they're almost all foreign policy hot. wealthy british style bankrolls.

market finance scandals find out what's really happening to the global economy for a no holds barred look at the global financial headlines join in to cause a report on our key. under the soviets this factory provided jobs for twelve thousand workers it made radio sets radio cassette players and tape recorders to cater to the needs of people across the soviet union. by the late one nine hundred eighty s. several plans making radio an elec tronic equipment had been set up in latvia they were the soviet union's most advanced enterprises. in soviet times i worked in a similar tree for about fifteen years before the break up of the soviet union there were close to eight hundred employees in the design bureau where i myself was

employed but you have no you can see what's left of its former splendor the only one design a working here. when lanphier achieved independence the republic's government began closing down its industrial giants the new regime expected more than compact and mobile enterprises to replace the old sluggish and largely outdated soviet factories but they were never built in adequate numbers. during the first five years of independence many enterprises which turned into scrap metal over the levee has sold it off cheap and lived off the money real estate and land were also soldiering this time which was a somewhat biggest source of funds during another five year period he will probably have to rely on lines just before the country join the european union an avalanche of capital and low interest credit came in here they were not meant to develop production instead they were channelled into land in real estate as

a result wind up in the situation. similar processes were going on in agriculture under the soviet government latvian collective farm supplied the republic with basic foodstuffs today half are imported. this emerged from the netherlands again these are from spain with the key members from the netherlands to. be hard put to find to mystically produced vegetables here true danger in pineapples don't grow the least onions were already being grown in latvia when the netherlands did not yet exist. after the declaration of independence the latvian government downsized angry culture and baited on individual farms the land belonging to collective farms was given back to former owners all their descendants

under restitution plan. but most of them simply didn't bother to get into the difficult business of farming and instead prefer to sell off the newly acquired land mortgage it. is just the senior legal have been abandoned in the farm stands work that had already abandoned about sixty percent of them because young people are not keen to go back to the countryside to your point here some get an education others find a job and school grant to make commitments of things that whether it's. the village of qana billy is in latvia one of the country's poorest regions local peasants used to regard themselves almost as urban dwellers they lived in flats with all modern amenities and now one in every two flats is vacant. but the local boiler house plant doesn't work the few people who still live here have to heat

their homes with firewood. sometimes i fetch firewood once a day sometimes i do it twice a day and then i don't do it for three or four days my grandchildren give me a helping hand when they were little i would bring firewood by cart. and fisa has five children and none of them live in latvia now they are trying to make money in a western europe. and faeces spends her pension to feed her grandchildren she likes talking about her big family which is now scattered around the world now covered with this is my daughter to give me a look that's. in the field. and here is a good llama and you cut it in the idea is my granddaughter concept but when i turned i went to london to work there she left these little things in my care this boy was one year old and that one was in the third grade that's their dad the god

knows where so i raised them on my own. people have no jobs towns and villages are becoming deserted picks dies and count sheds the collapsing and the fields overgrown with weeds. this is how each morning began victoria marina's one until two thousand and eight. flats in a nineteenth century building in the old parts of riga was once considered prestigious poor young people years until the move they paid back of course. after latvia declared independence old houses were given back to their former owners and their restitution plan. they were quick to realize that managing an apartment house was difficult selling

a building itself was easy but dealing with tenants was the main hurdle. the standard solution was that the new owners simply made sure that the building forced into a state of total disrepair and then its tenants were evicted under a court ruling. today three years later there isn't any electricity in the house where victoria used to live she gave up and rented a small flat in a new building a school and i have to visit my old apartment regularly to see if everything is an accident because the landlord has a habit of preaching and replacing the locks on the door. i also take some of my doomed it's with me. the tenants of the house have seen the landlord only once since they filed a lawsuit against him in two thousand and six so far their attempts to win their case have been unsuccessful the landlord lives in germany he came to latvia for the first time to receive

a property certificate. thanks to. the land in central riga is the most expensive in the country. this huge trading center is the private property of a norwegian building company. it buys the most profitable pieces of land in lanphier and builds hotels and supermarkets there. for us now is the best time to win but it's just been very profitable. for but they also have what they call the grey economy so that it's not really showing up on the statistics. after lengthy and join the european union in two thousand and four the economist started to warn of a new threat. they maintained that they were public might lose its economic sovereignty. about seventy percent of its farmland belongs to foreign investors they countries face school system depends on foreign banks. when you plug each kid

a scandinavian capital controls some seventy or eighty percent of the country's banking capital and enough this means it controls just as much of its financial system with the closing regrettably of the nation has lost its ability to work manufacture things. latvia was on the point of leaving the soviet union it was one of its most advanced territories with zero debts with blue and gold today the picture is the oldest brother got a king. in january two thousand and nine mass protests sway the latvian capital. the world economic crises had a huge impact on the country's economy people demanded the resignation of the government grant could stabilize the situation. moreover pensions look cuts as well as salaries and social donations.

these were due to the crisis is the result of the country's split into twenty years ago people would be most on leave that's why half of the nation plays no part in the country's laws political or otherwise this is one cause of the deep crisis we're going through as well. according to your game it is six land that is the poorest country in the european union are today high as local nationalists look to blame russian speaking nonresidents people are leaving the country in large numbers in search of a better life. clashes population has shrunk on more than fifteen percent since independence according to latvia's foreign policy institute each year some twelve thousand people leave the country for good. the u.k. is their most popular destination. the british

filmmaker cameron north described the problem in his documentary. with a lot of instruments the. first the one of his is the economy love. and life love is much harder played good living partly because nationalism him mad about nash's and love them getting economy well the reason is that they get very good social rights in the u.k. . it's now been twenty years since last the energy sovereignty. but still independence day it's a most celebrated holiday and the freedom monument its main national icon alien to hoffa of the country's population.

keep. it. all.