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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: December 6th, 2023

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  • What Latvia is doing is requiring that residents that Russian citizen residents that have been living in Latvia for a long time naturalize as citizens. The requirement for naturalization is an A2 language test and some paperwork (paperwork and meetings can be done in Russian language convetionally.)

    This action by the Latvian government forced naturaliszation of the vast majority of residents left in this non-citizen situation. A portion of those non-citizans are unable to follow the requirement (usually too old to learn the language); they are political casualties - so far it appears to be in the 10s or 100s. Another portion of those non-citizens refuse to follow the requirement; they are political martyrs.

    Why is Latvia (and EE and LT) doing this?

    Because Russia threatens nations with Russian ethnic populations, of the nation doesn’t conform to Russian political perspectives.





  • Your analysis isn’t great.

    Intertwined economies made sense for many reasons, when we all thought that we could work together. Now the world has changed, and many nations want to work against each other.

    Europe’s good actors are likely trying decide how long they need to build relations that are not so sensitive to these kinds of disruptions, and trying to decide how much they need to put up with until then. Europe’s bad actors are trying to figure out how to leverage tensions for more domestic power.