Heh!  How’d y’al like Gee Dub’s Texas rendition of ‘Laaahbdeeen’?!  I’m always happy to see Latvia gain recognition.  I was even surprised to see Latvia mentioned in our little local yokel town newspaper, cited as the first place to have a xmas tree back in the early 1500’s (which BTW, I think, is not totally accurate according to a discussion here once on the forum about this very subject).  But what the heck!

Hate to put a damper on things, but I am disappointed (still naive, I guess), about everything coming with a price tag; more Latvians being sent to Iraq in return for the easing up of visa restrictions and so forth and so on…

Irena

The man with the donkey ears makes his move.

Andrejs

Dinner With Jacques
At NATO Summit, Putin Creates Some Indigestion

By Jackson Diehl
Thursday, November 30, 2006; Page A23

RIGA, Latvia—NATO’s summit meeting here this week was supposed to be focused on bolstering its fight in Afghanistan and celebrating the freedom of Latvia and two other Baltic states that have made an astounding transition from captive nations under Soviet rule to democratic Western allies. So why was all the intrigue and backroom maneuvering about Vladimir Putin?

The answer to that question is a tangled diplomatic tale about the stubborn vainglory of French President Jacques Chirac and the equally implacable determination of Putin to humiliate and undermine the independent governments of former Soviet republics. It says a lot about the state of the Western alliance: the weakness of much of its present leadership and the deep confusion about how to answer the growing challenge—some would say menace—of Putin’s Russia

For senior officials of the Bush administration, the drama began Monday, when they abruptly learned that Chirac had—without consulting fellow allies—agreed with Putin on a dinner in Riga on Wednesday night, immediately after the summit’s conclusion. Supposedly the intent was to celebrate the 74th birthday of the lame-duck Chirac, whose term ends next spring. But U.S. officials quickly perceived the gambit for what it was: a last attempt to needle and upstage the lame-duck American president with whom Chirac has quarreled for six years.

Bush, after all, was to deliver a speech in Riga celebrating the Baltic revolt against rule from Moscow and urging an open door at NATO for other nations trying to free themselves from Russian dominion:
Georgia, Ukraine, even Belarus. And as Chirac knew, Bush was to leave Riga well before the dinner hour.

Putin had his own special interest. No Russian president has set foot in Latvia, Lithuania or Estonia since they gained independence in 1991. Moscow’s policy toward those countries has featured border disputes, demands for special treatment for Russian minorities and attempts to gain control over key pieces of economic infrastructure.
Nominally a Putin visit would have done an honor to Latvia’s already much-honored president, Vaira Vike-Freiberga. Only Putin’s intention was to insult Vike-Freiberga by relegating her to the status of third wheel at a summit dinner—as if she were a provincial governor rather than a head of state.

As NATO technocrats bargained over the conclusions of the summit—which ended up giving a modest boost to the Afghanistan mission and the prospects for the future acceptance of new members—the Chirac-Putin stink bomb produced a wave of revulsion, confusion and, eventually, tactical maneuvering among the allied delegations. German Chancellor Angela Merkel was invited to attend the dinner and thus recreate the Berlin-Paris-Moscow troika that opposed Bush during the Iraq war. But she declined, citing a suddenly urgent cabinet meeting in Berlin.

U.S. officials, meanwhile, pointed out to Latvian counterparts that they need not go along with the dinner if there was no benefit for Latvia. To her credit, Vike-Freiberga—whom Bush called “the Iron Lady of the Baltics” when he appeared with her Tuesday—let it be known that Putin would be welcome, provided that he made time for a bilateral visit with the Latvian president.

The Russian response was entirely predictable: Putin, who was attending his own summit meeting of the Commonwealth of Independent States in nearby Minsk, Belarus, suddenly couldn’t fit a stop-off in Riga into his schedule after all. Birthday-boy Chirac was relegated to accepting a cake from Vike-Freiberga, along with the usual French role of bickering over the fine points of a NATO agenda driven by the United States.

In all, a trivial tempest. But there was a lingering lesson: The Western allies have no idea what to do about Putin. Five years ago the energetic former KGB colonel was regarded as a strategic partner for NATO and its members. Now he is generally understood to be an autocratic imperialist whose political enemies suffer from a high rate of sinister poisonings. Bush and other NATO leaders aren’t ready to act on that understanding, or even to state it out loud. But the idea of having the man to their summit meeting has become a little creepy
-- something only a bitter French lame duck would do.

Thank you, my dearest Paps, for posting my e-mail blurb online for the world to read (it almost beats the time you posted a description of my chaotic bout with Candida). Just to explain to my journalistic colleagues here in Latvia (who are getting a kick out of my use of BOLDS and teenage need to elongate words such as “reeeeaaally creepy” and “soooo cool”) that e-mail was written to my lovely little sister (and CCd to my dad), hence the casual use of teenage terms and emphatic exclamation.

I just want to say, if the editor of a newspaper can’t shed her professional pretensions once and a while and fall back to that wonderfully careless teenage voice when writing her favorite little sister, that’s when you know you’ve taken the reputation of your profession too far. Thank God for my humility. And yes, “bush for bush” did make me chuckle.:)

So, Elizabeth, what’s post NATO-summit Riga like?  Everything forgotten, back to normal, no repercussions?

Or are the papers full of recriminations (as they were post hockey championship, post Bush visit, etc.) for the Potemkin-village need to spruce everything up, for the insane security restrictions, etc.?

And the question everyone wants to know the answer to...is the Christmas market set up in Dom Square yet? :-)

Opps, I think I am in trouble for lifting a paragraph out of her email. 

But with all the talk about the NATO summit being so exciting, I thought we should also know what life is like for the people on the street.  These political heads create havoc for the regular people.  The last several times Bush was in Seattle, the traffic between Boeing Field and wherever he was going was usually shut down for several hours, irritating the hell out of the general population, particularly in his case where they do not let the general public near his speeches unless you have proof of the cancelled contribution check.

Sorry, Elizabeth, I just found your description honest and delightful.

See you in a week.

Jani...if this is the most embarassing you are as a parent, your daughter has a lot to be thankful for! :-)

Have a great time with your daughter and in Riga.  Safe voyage…

“Is the Christmas market set up in Dom Square yet? 

No, not yet, but there will be a big, big ice-rink, fewer market stalls in the square, but expand to the side streets.

Poor Chirac!  He thought that he would trump Bush with the help of Putin, but ended up being used by Putin, and then left in the lurch!

Don’t worry Paps, you’re in no trouble (althougnh I cannot say the same for a particular Mr. Christmas tree). Us 4kidz have long been used to - and these days endeared by - your ‘Oh great, Paps’ ways. I look forward to seeing you in a few weeks too. 

Irena, that fable about Luther inventing the Christmas Tree in Riga will never die. Nothing in scholarship is immortal except error, and in the world of urban legend it has no competition. People also believe that Luther wrote “Away in a manger,” and that St Ambrose wrote the hymn tune “Grosser Gott, wir loben dich” (don’t recall the Latvian translation). “Nylon” is an acronym for “New York and London”; one vote in Congress prevented German from becoming the national language of the United States; the f word is an acronym of “for unlawful carnal knowledge”; etc etc. Why do we need chemical fertilizers when the world is so full of bovine excrement (and not all of it originates in Moscow, either)?

Stephen

Don’t have time to go into great detail because work and life goes on after the summit. But just a few observations on the Summit.

First of all, Latvia proved once again it is very capable of hosting something as complex, massive and important as the NATO Summit. We proved it earlier with the Hockey Championships, with Eurovision and the Riga 800 celebration, to name only a few large scale events. By all accounts, the organisation of the event at all levels was superb.

Actually there were several events going on simultaneously. While only presidents, prime ministers and their delegations attended the Summit at the Olympic Center, a major think tank conference, called, of course, ‘The Riga Conference’, took place at Melngalva Nams. This was attended by the likes of Zbigniew Brzezinski, Sen. Jeff Sessions, Rudy Giuliani and the top foreign policy/security experts of Europe and the US. Bush, VVF and Hoop de Scheffer also spoke at the Riga Conference. A second Young Leaders conference took place across the square at Rigas Dome.

Bush spoke at Latvijas Universitate, a dinner was held at Maza Gilde and the gala concert took place at the Opera. Contrary to what was reported here, the city was not shut down. Actually, it was much more open than a year ago when Bush spoke here. Most of the Double Coffees were open in Old Town, as were some shops. Many, of course, closed because they didn’t expect any business. Too bad. The reporters and delegations were looking for things to do.

While there were security fences around the Opera for a day, the rest of Old Town was accessible. If you were one of several hundred attendees at the two Conferences, you had access to all of Old Town most of the time.

Most Latvians I have spoken were generally pleased by the event. Since the Summit days were holidays, many left town for an extended vacation and enjoyed themselves. So far,the major complaints have come from businesses that lost money during the limited shut down, and from the police, who had to work 12-hour shifts with no access to toilets and little food. Latvia’s security services learned a lot from the first Bush visit and learned even more from the Summit. Each time, we get a little bit better at handling these things.

Most foreigners I spoke to were very impressed by the arrangements and the city. I’m also glad to hear that the media coverage gave a lot of exposure to Riga. Credit for this goes to those who arranged the backdrops for the Summit, Conference and Bush’s speech - in each case, the word ‘Riga’ and the skyline featured prominently. This is the best promotion Riga has ever received. I think this will be a big boost for the Riga Convention Bureau which was created last year to promote business tourism. (I can already see one ad in the future: “Why did 26 of the world’s top executives decide to hold their business meeting in Riga?")

I am one of the few who regrets that Putin didn’t come. I was ready with another ad for that one:  ‘RIGA - THE CITY WHERE PRESIDENTS COMES TO PARTY!” (Clearly Paris and Moscow just don’t compare to Riga for birthday bashes.)

As for the heroes of the summit, I’d say that Edgars Rinkevics, State Secretary of the Def Min deserves a monument for what he did. I’ve never seen better management and a cooler, clearer head. Credit also goes out to the 600 young volunteers who smiled, were helpful and friendly throughout the Summit. These kids were great and really left a wonderful impression on all the guests. Finally, the police and security personnel deserve credit, because they too maintained cool heads and calmness thru it all. I think they did an outstanding job under very difficult circumstances.

I am very proud of this city and country, and the people who made all this happen.

To Stephen:

I suggest you read Umberto Eco’s ‘Foucault’s Pendulum’ and ‘Baudolino’. Reality tends to be what people believe it is. How many people know that an ad agency for Coca Cola created the now iconic red-suited, white-bearded Santa Claus? Does it matter? Did Shakespeare really write those plays? Who cares? The legend of the first Riga Christmas Tree has been activated and let loose on the world. So be it. We are what we believe.

OJ Collins the Tsunami Man posted a few observations about the NATO summit, including this:

< If you were one of several hundred attendees at the two Conferences, you had access to all of Old Town most of the time.>

and this:

< I am one of the few who regrets that Putin didn’t come. I was ready with another ad for that one: ‘RIGA - THE CITY WHERE PRESIDENTS COMES TO PARTY!">

and this:

< We are what we believe.>

No comment.

Tarmo the Nordic {sic} a.k.a. Gelge W. Twigg {sic} a.k.a. El Subcommandante {sic}a.k.a. You Heathen Rabble {sic}

And we pay 32,000,000.ooLS for
sending an army squad to Afganistan,
cuz Canucks are splitting, eh?

pete

Ojar, I read _FP_ when it first came out in the US (I think that, among other things, it’s a sendup of _Holy Grail, Holy Blood_, the source for _The DaVinci Code_ by D. FromExeter).

I’m not complaining. If people want to believe that before Columbus everyone thought that the earth was flat, or that George Washington cut down that cherry tree, or that toads give you warts, it’s no hair off our dupsis.

Stephen