How Russia will respond to the ban of St. George’s ribbon in Latvia – Rossiyskaya Gazeta
The Seim of Latvia has legally banned St. George’s ribbons. Latvia, the second country after Ukraine, where the symbol of Victory over fascism is outlawed.
“The ban will come into force by May 9,” says Polina Kamleva, coordinator of the Victory Volunteers movement in the city of Rezekne (Latvia), “but it will not cancel the Victory Day. The format of the holiday and the procession of the “Immortal Regiment” will change: we do not agree with the absurdity when it is impossible to honor the memory of 150 thousand Soviet soldiers who died for Latvia, and 4000 thousand living veterans cannot wear the Victory ribbon, but we are law-abiding. We’ll come up with something.
As Kamleva noted, the ban on St. George’s ribbons fits into the logic of the “doctrine of Soviet occupation” – the ban on Soviet symbols and the wearing of Soviet uniforms, attacks on the Russian language and Russian-language media, and the closure of Russian schools.
“This is the reincarnation of the logic of nationalism and Nazism,” said Maria Zakharova, an official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, “which is expected for a country where every 101st person has the shameful status of a non-citizen. We do not reduce the defense of the rights of compatriots to harsh statements. A firm position is not necessarily publicly expressed. Publicly, we will continue to popularize the St. George ribbon and will defend the historical truth.
In a non-public but systematic response to the provocative policy of the Latvian authorities, State Duma Deputy Alexander Khinshtein is considering by Russian parliamentarians the law banning entry into the country of those politicians who prepare and pass laws on rewriting the history of World War II. He called the draft law “the law on Russophobes”, noting that in Russia people who voted for the symbol of Victory are known by name, but they come to Russia to rest or to visit their parents.
“Any law has a name and surname,” noted public figures of Lithuania and Latvia, who contacted Moscow online. To your question – what to do? – they replied with a request: “To support the sympathizers of Russia. So in Riga, the Seim is again discussing the idea of transferring or removing from the country a monument to the Soviet liberator soldier.
“In Latvia, they outraged the decision of Nuremberg, which outlawed Nazism, to prepare a new outrage,” says Mikhail Myagkov, scientific director of the Russian Military Historical Society (RVIO), “but we will continue to defend the truth. It is that if it were not for the Soviet people, there would be no Baltics, there would be a zone of concentration camps and autobahns to them. Prohibitions cannot rewrite history.
Another response to the ban on St. George’s ribbons was the announcement of a new action by the “Victory Volunteers” of Latvia – the launch of a project of video memories of World War II veterans, including veterans of different EU countries, about the path to Victory.