once again flared up. and these are the images the world has been seeing from the streets of canada. trying to corporations rule today. this is also you coming to you live from moscow the headlines. for the deaths in syria as an arab league holds amazing to damascus to end the violence has just cost twelve more how the cold as international pressure continues to mount on the our friend regime to stop the bloodshed. at least one person has been killed and more than six hundred hurt in clashes with police in cairo as turns up thousands of egyptians return to previous where demanding the military and the free on town.

also leave it also was his country moment could dump his downside on his alarm and already suggest he could face the death penalty but the question marks over the balance of the trial comes up defending the. ground and he corporate protesters are camping again in zuccotti park in new york after being evicted by police and tuesday california students have been rabbits afraid by officers accused of using brutal and had a kind of tactics against a peaceful protest over social inequality arms tuition hikes. those are the headlines for you guys gone next a special report looking into how former soviet states have that twenty years after the collapse of the u.s.s.r. today wearing the art here. it seems blanched used independent state it's company fanfare much of any other

public holiday in the country on this day the republic's talk leaders gathered to lay flowers and the freedom monument in latvia's capsule rigo. informal events like torture sessions 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 procession zoltan eyes by the radical nationalist party known as 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.

let me lindemann is a columnist for several months in newspapers you'll soon vista gates cases of public interest and publishes reports on them but even though vladimir holds a lot in passports he's taken clearly not a fully fledged citizen of his own country. not with the passport cover bears a unique inscription if the photo was written in latvian it says your passport of a non-citizen was a reserve note that it was more on the main peerage in the english translation it reads really answers our problem times we are called just that aliens like we are from another planet even full of you pointed international law we are treated as such just the present there are something like four hundred thousand such people in latvia or state of sort this. man feel 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. this applied to not only those who settled down in the country after nine hundred forty but their descendants. again the truth is i don't want to be a second class person i want to be a citizen of the one she where live if. any known citizen is free to try to naturalize van't they need to pass exams on the country's history and show the command of the state language and the national anthem if 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 the year 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 a day here and refused to leave it after office hours when the police force me out of. there was a time when victor durgan off a nice to taste and valdis samplers a trauma surgeon who worked in the same hospital. now zuck loses latvia's president the north is a member of latvia's anti fascist committee. was the possibility i can't bear to see the revival naziism in libya i can see it with the naked eye and the result would upset me most of all is that so-called democratic europe closes its eyes to

the revival not as a group as the word was. on march sixteenth nineteen forty three during the second world war the laugh-in legion was formed. thousands of volunteers in the country signed up to fight for the nazis. off independence every year on the state legion veterans have been officially committed to hold a parade in central riga. in two thousand and five victor dugan often several other hand the fascists clans and prison robes to in the wake of marching legionnaires. the police dispersed all the empty 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 was. cool still our actions were in line with the united nations resolution calling for resistance to all forces that promote the waffen s.s. to prevent your offer with. some fourteen thousand veterans living in latvia to j. forts in the soviet army during world war two. if kenichi convinced there was a paratrooper event. as he moves to the monument commemorating the soviet soldiers who lost their lives in the war to make sure the nobody sees his medals. a law passed back in one nine hundred. the one bans the public display of soviet symbols . the attitude to us is just a bomb on a bus or. 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 mans that go ahead. with. the monument to soviet soldiers in riga was blown up in one thousand nine hundred eight it was later restored to the act and he masterminded by egos. 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 to 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. in the year when he got a fish can blow up the monument another event occurred that course the world's

attention. former soviet past has done vasily kononov had been brought before a latvian court to face criminal challenges face actions in world war two it did it a little this is the order of lenin only gave it to me for blowing up six team german trains when i was a partisan issue krishna traditional. in northern latvia the ex 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 and their lackeys started a massive campaign against anti-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. ivers garder is leader of a political organization called the national front of lance via the front publishes a newspaper founded by him. edge weekends and during public holidays volunteers hand out free copies to anyone willing to read the paper. its name contains three d's they stand for d. occupation the call in isolation and d. russification. for a long time dr goddard taught ethics at the academy of culture some of his former students are 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. ethnic lothians make up fifty percent of the population of their own country and the other fifty percent

are occupies backed by russian. police here with workers 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 here so it's. cameron north a british filmmaker decided to make a personal investigation into the into ethnic relations between russians and that fiends. he shot a documentary called latvia and hitler's footsteps way draws uncomfortable parallels between present day lanphier and nazi germany. during the second world war and of that. they must go. off it was a diversion. i'm on board and i. think

that it would like to say it's national. be the languages are the same as they were they had to. speak latvian things about rights and not feel if you're not a citizen called. the coalition of 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 is a school people. papa tell me what the sentence means. is often at the last when he tries to figure out his math textbook it's written in latvia and. the internet translator says it means headline well yes that's

a possibility. a country schools were formed in the middle of the past decade it was 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. for those who were never russians aitches with the ball commander the levy languished teach such difficult subjects mathematics physics and chemistry to russian schoolchildren it brings misery was abuzz teachers and streams with even within your tenure. in the course of education reform nearly all the 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 final . so far inspectors have been shown up in many russian schools and all subjects are

still taught in russian. matfield language textbooks approved by the education ministry can be seen in full view but they are only for show. new lucia cough 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 shot soley for economic all rather demographic reasons half of the classrooms in one third of all schools had no people's. morgan freeman. many of the decisions taken by the previous mayor were largely politically motivated that was the basis for decisions about whether schools should be closed down rules and when we merge schools we make a great deal of effort to accommodate all the children in the new building since we also do all we can to retain jobs for the teachers or as most but in the old days

they just closed schools down and that was lapse last probably from. the fact that the russian was elected mayor of the latvian capital in the summer of two thousand and nine surprised many politicians analysts put it down into the economic crisis. those who had felt it. severe impact we're not taking as much notice of the nationality of a politician as they used to. use the word if in the early one nine hundred ninety s. they have not made the mistake of dividing the people into citizens of the non-citizen we're here because the politicians would have been compelled to talk about the economy social issues and structural reforms or instead of harping on the theme of latvians and russians every two or four years we're much and we would have been able to deal with pressing issues much earlier and much more efficiently or still have to contend with economic issues corruption and many other things and we're

going to. despite its small size there was scores 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 lines stand idle. factory workers an engine is going to small business. grant for years highly skilled professionals have left the country in search of a job. 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 elektra on equipment had been set up in latvia they were the soviet union's most advanced enterprises would know of the go 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 have no you can see what's left of its former splendor only one designer 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 you know with during the first five years of independence many enterprises were turned into scrap metal levy are sold off cheap and lived off the money real estate and land are also soldiering this time which was a somewhat bigger source of funds during another five year period he will probably have to rely on alliance just before the country join the european union and

avalanche of capital and low interest credit came here when they were not meant to develop production all before instead they were channeled into land and real estate as a result wind up in the situation. similar process is were going on in agriculture under the soviet government that human collective farm supplied the republic with basic food stuffs today half are imported. below the genes of from spain and this emerged from the netherlands again these are from spain the food the cucumbers from the netherlands thought is good a lot of these are good be hard put to find them is usually produced vegetables here trouper the danger in some pineapples don't grow here is the list onions were already being grown in latvia when the netherlands did not yet exist. after the declaration of independence the latvian government downsized agriculture

and betting on individual farms 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 a new you acquired land or mortgage it. is just the thing you evil have been abandoned in the farmsteads have already abandoned about sixty percent of them as young people and have kids to go back to the countryside here some get an education others find a job and good brought to make them into things that whether it's. the village of congolese is in let's ghalia one of the country's poorest regions and local peasants used to regard themselves almost as urban dwellers they lived in flats with all modern amenities now one in every two flats is vacant.

the local boy louse plants doesn't work the few people who still live here have to heat their homes with by woods. 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 he has five children and none of them live in latvia now they are trying to make money in the west and europe. and faeces spends her pension to feed her grandchildren she likes talking about her big family which is now scattered around the world that i work with this is my daughter to give me a love that's. in the high yield. and here is a good lama and you could be in nigeria is my granddaughter i want to take you on

the way 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. their dad for god knows where so i raise them on my own. people have no jobs towns and villages are becoming deserted pig sties and count sheds collapsing and the fields overgrown with weeds. this is how each morning began in victoria more than a month until two thousand and eight. flats in a nineteenth century building in the old parts of riga was once considered prestigious poor young people are spent on the move they paid back of course. after latvia declared independence old houses were given back so they form

a onus on 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 forts and to 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 flaten a new building a school and i have to visit my old apartment regularly to see if everything is an order that because the landlord has a habit of breaching and replacing the locks on the door. i also take some of my belongings with me. the tenants of the house have seen the landlord's only one 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 they came to latvia for the first time to receive a properties are difficult. 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 invest has been very profitable. for but they also have what they call the grey economy so that's not the real it over not understood this that. often land fee 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 the country's

fiscal system depends on foreign banks. so you wouldn't here today scandinavian capital controls some seventy or eighty percent of the country's banking capital is going to not this means it controls just as much of its financial system of the regrettably of the nation has lost its ability to work in manufacturing things a lot of latvia was on the point of leaving the soviet union it was one of its most advanced territories with zero jets flew in gold's data picture is the oldest city . 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 when it couldn't stabilize the situation. rosa pensions look cuts as

well as salaries and social donations. he says would you do the crisis is the result of the country split into twenty years ago people used to only that's why after the nation plays no part in the country's last political or other was this is one cause of the deep crisis we're going through and please we want to quit working. according to europe against its six lanfear that is the poorest country in the european union today. 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 by more than fifteen percent since independence. according to latvia's foreign policy institute e.c.u. 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 things coming to the u.k. . firstly one of the things is that economy left. in life now is much harder for good living partly because the nationalism the i'm mad about nash is i'm one of them putting the economy well the reason is that they've got a very good social rights in the u.k. . it's now been twenty years since a lot of the energy for so frontier. but still independence day is most celebrated holiday and the freedom monument its main national icon aliant the heart of the

country's population.