breaking news the salvaging military launches a major assault on protesters in cairo's tahrir square but intense using tear gas and firing rubber bullets have a thousand of those running into the military rulers have been injured and at least three killed in fierce clashes. in other stories the shoot them this week darkened over the syrian government as the deadline set by the arab league to end violence expires the president assad is defined in the face of growing international pressure. to monitor venti call propose us an american mark of files and strong marches all over the u.s. hundreds of arrests and a heavy handed police response. as our top stories at the moment up next our special report delving deep into let vs twenty years out of the country stepped out

from the ruins of the soviet union. band aid seems to be used in the current state it's company fanfare of any other public holiday in the country on this day the republic's top leaders gathered to lay flowers and the freedom monument in latvia scarcer riga. 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 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 he also investigate cases of public interest and publishes reports on them but even though vladimir holds a lack in passports he's technically not a fully fledged citizen of his own country. is the passport cover bears a unique inscription the good order written in latvian it says your passport of a non-citizen was a reserve not that it was more on the main page in the english translation it reads alien spirits ours and sometimes we are called just that aliens like we are from

another planet or even full of you point of international law we are treated as such just is not present there are something like four hundred thousand such people in latvia this is. mansfield became an independent state in one thousand nine hundred one office a seeding 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 authours or work in government departments. this applied to not only those who settled down in the country after nine hundred forty but their descendants take. again truth is i don't want to be a second class person i want to be a citizen of the country where i live in this country. any known citizen is free to try to naturalize the event they need to pass exams on the country's history and

show they command of the state language and the national anthem. after submitting even 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 never. even stage a sit in in this building i spent the 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 the taste and valdis samplers a trauma surgeon who worked in the same hospital. now zach loses latvia's president

they're going off he's a member of latvia's anti fascist committee. was the possibility they can't bear to see the revival of naziism in libya i can see it with the naked eye in the waters of the world upsets me most of all is that so-called democratic europe closes its eyes to the revival not as a group as a crew it was a. 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 committed to hold a parade in central region. in two thousand and five people today are going off and several other anti fascist clans and prison rape stood in

the way of marching legionnaires. the police dispersed all the anti-fascists and let the s.s. veterans put the flowers at the freedom monument. cautious but. 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. pull 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 convincing 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 ninety nine. anti one bans the public display of soviet symbols. the attitude to us is just a bowman about. 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 were going toward. 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 he goes. 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 that 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 shishkin blew up the monument another event occurred that course the world's attention. former soviet past is unfair silly kononov had been brought before a latvian court to face criminal challenges face actions and world war two ended it toward the end this is the order of lenin but he gave it to me for blowing up sixteen german trains when i was a partisan issue krishna tradition. in more than 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 a decision taken by

a party as an tribunals and nine hundred forty three. when radical nationalists came to power after the regime change their lackeys started a massive campaign against intel fascists who had fought in the entire hitler coalition they were all to review the elkan of the war in order to whitewash naziism and fascism and as usual pushes a. i was going to is leader of a political organization called the national front of latvia the front publishes a newspaper founded by him. better 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 d. occupation the colonized station and d. russification. for a long time dr goddard taught ethics at the academy of culture some of his former

students a regular contributors to the newspaper. now under their chief and its guidance they spend no effort in a bid to oppose what they call russian dominance in latvia. ethnic lottery and make up fifty percent of the population of their own contract with the other fifty percent occupiers back to my russian. political youth it's necessary to create uncountable conventions 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 so that's. cameron north a 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 lanphier and nazi germany. during the second world war and of the sort of. the must go. but there must be rather a. bottom on. some things it would like to say it's nationalistic in that the the languages are the same as they were they had to. speak about. the things about defense and rights in latvia if you're not a citizen. of six of the drops and the culmination of things where you are discriminated against because your impure. duty 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 eli is a school people. papa tell me what percent means. is often at the loss 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. 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've who whenever a russian teaches with a poor command of the levee and languished teach such difficult subjects mathematics physics and chemistry were to russian schoolchildren it brings misery was abuzz teachers and students with you committed within you to neutral. 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 life is education ministry were final. so far inspectors haven't 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 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 shot solely for economic all rather demographic reasons half of the classrooms in one third of all schools had no

pupils. were given a good 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 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 almost but in the old days they just closed schools down and that was that your story but. the fact of 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 group if in the early one nine hundred ninety s. they had not made the mistake of dividing the people into citizens of unknown citizens

were 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're much and we would have been able to deal with pressing issues much earlier and much more efficiently or will 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. plants vs highly skilled professionals have left the country in search of

a job. well the coolies technology innovation all the least of elements from around russia we've got the future covered. 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 in elec tronic equipment had been set up in latvia they were the soviet union's most advanced enterprises. of the 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 are you know you can see what's left of its were almost burned out of only one design a working year. when lanphier achieved independence the republic's government began closing down its industrial giants the new regime expected margin compact and mobile enterprises to replace the old sluggish and largely outdated soviet

factories but they were never built in adequate numbers. yeah during the first five years of independence many enterprises were turned into scrap metal over the levee and sold it off cheap in lived off the money real estate and landrieu also soldiering this time which was a somewhat biggest source of funds during another five year period. lines just before the country join the european union and avalanche of capital and low interest credit came in here when they were not meant to develop production instead they were channeled into land and real estate as a result wind up in this situation. similar process is going on in agriculture under the soviet government latvian collective farm supplied the republic with basic foodstuffs today half are

imported. he is the illusions of from spain has emerged from the netherlands again these are from spain the cucumbers from the netherlands to. be hard to find to mystically produced vegetables here true danger in pineapples don't grow here. were already being grown in latvia when the netherlands did not yet exist. after the declaration of independence the land government downsized agriculture and baited on individual farms land belonging to collective farms was given back to former owners all their descendants under a 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 or mortgage it. just the senior people have been abandoned the farm stands now have

already abandoned about sixty percent of them as young people are not keen to go back to the countryside here some get an education others find a job center told grant to make commitments that. the village of qana billy is in let's go. 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 and now one in every two flats is vacant. but the local boiler houseplants 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 has five children 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 god you. that's. in the high yield. and here is that lama and your cup of tea and the idea is my granddaughter. when 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. their dads god knows where so i raise them on my own. people have no jobs towns and villages are becoming deserted pig sties encounter sheds collapsing on the fields overgrown with weeds.

this is how the morning began 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 but who were young players bent on the move the payback worth. 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 fall 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 all the departments regularly to see if everything is in that because the landlord has a habit of brazenly and replacing the locks on the door. i also take some of my doom goods 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 properties are difficult. thanks. 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 really showing up on this that this that. often memphian joined 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 when you plug each kid a 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 with the regrettably the nation has lost its ability to work in manufacturing things when that failed was on the point of leaving the soviet union it was one of its most advanced territories with zero debt it's going to win gold

today the picture is the oldest son of god look at a king. in january two thousand and nine mass protests when the latvian capital. of 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. arose pensions lookouts as well as salaries and social to nations. has been cheating the crisis is the result of the country's split into twenty years ago people used to tell me that's why half of the nation plays no part in the country's life and you've got a little or otherwise this is one cause of the deep crisis we're going through increases with the group working. according to

european statistics land for that is the poorest country in the european union today. as local nationalist looks and claim russian speaking nonresidents people are leaving the country in large numbers in search of a better life. clashes population has shrunk down 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. in the philippines come clear cut. first the one of reasons is that economy left. in life not as much as a plant good living partly because the nationals i'm. mad about nash's i'm more of

them getting economy now the reason is that they've got a very good social riots in the u.k. . it's now been twenty years since latvia geve sovereignty. but still independence day its most celebrated holiday and the freedom monument its main national icon aliens the heart of the country's population. the.

more news today violence is once again flared up. and these are the images the world has been seeing from the streets of canada. trying to corporations or the day .