As expected, the Saeima has rejected a bill that would amend Latvia’s constitution to make Russian an official state language.

The Dec. 22 vote was a formality, because regardless of the parliament’s decision the issue must now be put to a national referendum. One of the paragraphs the bill would change establishes Latvian as the state language, and that constitutional provision may only be amended through a referendum.

In a special session, the Saeima killed the bill on its first reading. Sixty MPs voted against sending the bill to committee, no one voted in favor, and one MP abstained. MPs from the largely ethnic Russian political party Harmony Centre (Saskaņas centrs) walked out of the meeting before the vote.

The legislation would change five paragraphs of the constitution, giving the Russian language equal status to Latvian. The bill has been pushed by the pro-Russian group Dzimtā valoda (Native Language), led by the controversial Vladimirs Lindermans. A citizen initiative held in November garnered 187,378 signatures in favor of the constitutional amendments, forcing the question before the Saeima.

After the Central Election Commission on Dec. 19 certified the results of the signature campaign, President Andris Bērziņš on Dec. 20 submitted the legislation to the parliament.

However, in a letter to Saeima Speaker Solvita Āboltiņa, the president pointed out that making Russian an official language would mean renouncing the core ideas that led to the founding of the Latvian state.

He added that the proposed legislation would not help unify Latvian society.

In the Saeima, Jānis Ādamsons of the center-left Harmony Centre spoke in favor of the bill, but concluded by announcing that his party would not participate in the “farce” of the vote. The more than 180,000 people who signed on to the initiative did so not because they are against Latvians or the Latvian language, Ādamsons said, but because they are opposed to the politics of the right wing.

“We are our country’s patriots,” Ādamsons said of Harmony Centre, according to a translation of the meeting’s transcript. “And we are concerned about Latvia’s future, because this is the land where our children and grandchildren will live. In the past 20 years, the right has allowed tens of mistakes in the areas of economics, finance and social issues. It will soon become clear that they have also allowed tens of mistakes in national politics.”

Ādamsons and the other Harmony Centre MPs then left the chamber.

Raivis Dzintars of the right-wing National Alliance (Nacionālā apvienība “Visu Latvijai!” – “Tēvzemei un Brīvībai/LNNK”) spoke against the bill, telling the remaining MPs that the legislation is an attack on the foundation of the Latvian state.

“In fact this spits in the face of those Latvians who already experienced 50 years of bilingualism, but without the opportunity to vote ‘No.’ In fact, with an aggressive campaign financed from abroad, an active struggle against Latvian statehood has been declared,” Dzintars said.

The Central Election Commission must now prepare the national referendum. According to media reports, the referendum may be set for Feb. 18.

While exact figures from this year’s census in Latvia won’t be available until after mid-January, provisional results show that the country’s population remains above 2 million.

However, Latvia will have lost an estimated 23,000 people this year to death and emigration, the Central Statistical Bureau (Centrālā statistikas pārvalde) announced Dec. 16 in Rīga.

The country’s population will be less than in the 2000 census, when 2.38 million people were counted. At the beginning of this year, according to the statistics bureau, Latvia was home to 2.23 million people.

Some earlier media reports suggested Latvia’s population had dropped to 1.9 million. In October, the statistics bureau reported that it had counted 1.9 million residents of Latvia from those who had completed census questionnaires through the Internet, had visited census posts or had been interviewed by census workers. However, the statistics bureau also noted that it had not yet counted everyone.

Latvia continues to be dogged by two dominant demographic issues, according to the data. First, the birth rate is well below the rate needed to replace those individuals who die. Second, emigration remains unabated, with thousands of residents leaving every year, moving mostly to Western Europe and North America.

Based on data from the first 10 months of this year and from estimates for November and December, Latvia in 2011 will have seen the largest net loss of population since 1997, according to the statistics bureau. The net loss this year will be an estimated 23,000, a drop of 1.03 percent from 2010; in 1997, the net loss was 24,123. Since Latvia regained independence in 1991, the largest net loss of population was in 1992 with 57,325 people.

Births have decreased during the past three years, according to the statistics bureau. Through the first 10 months of this year, a total of 15,700 birhs were recorded, which is a drop of 500 (2.9 percent) compared to the same period in 2010.

However, the number of deaths will be less this year than last, the statistics bureau predicts. Through October, the number of deaths stood at 23,800, compared to 25,000 during the same period last year.

The rate of emigration has “noticeably increased,” Maranda Behmane of the bureau’s social statistics department said in a press release. Through the first 10 months of this year, according to official data, a total of 14,900 people left Latvia. That’s 39.3 percent more than the total count of emigrants for all of last year—10,700.

One positive indicator in the data is the number of marriages, which might have an effect on the birth rate later, according to the statistics bureau. Through October, a total of 9,400 marriages were recorded, which is a bit more than in 2010. The statistics bureau predicts the total number of marriages for 2011 might reach 10,500.

The Latvian government has given its backing to a list of recommendations for proposed amendments to the country’s citizenship law, including allowing dual citizenship for World War II-era exiles and their descendants.

The Council of Ministers accepted the recommendations made by Justice Minister Gaidis Bērziņš during a Dec. 13 meeting in Rīga. The recommendations, many of which offer technical corrections, will now go to the parliament’s Legal Affairs Committee (Juridiskā komisija), which is considering a bill to amend the citizenship law.

“We are hoping for the Saeima to proceed actively to accept the amendments to the law as quickly as possible, because a large part of society is waiting for them, both in Latvia and around the world,” Bērziņš said in a government press release.

Before it was dissolved by July’s national referendum, the 10th Saeima was considering legislation sponsored by members of the Unity (Vienotība) party to change the citizenship law. The 11th Saeima’s Legal Affairs Committee reintroduced the bill (Nr. 52/Lp11) on Nov. 3. The committee now is waiting on recommendations for the legislation, which are due Jan. 1. The just-approved Justice Ministry recommendations are essentially the same as those made by the Interior Ministry in September.

Among the amendments would be one to lift the restriction on dual citizenship for exiles and their descendants. Under the current law, exiles and their descendants had until July 1995 to register as Latvian citizens without giving up the citizenship of their home country. The amendment defines exiles as those Latvian citizens who left their homeland between June 17, 1940, and May 4, 1990.

Dual citizenship also would be allowed for other groups, such as Latvian citizens who have become citizens of European Union or NATO defense alliance member states.

It is unacceptable, the justice minister said, that Latvians have been denied citizenship because of a formality: the restriction against dual citizenship.

“The Latvian state has a responsibility to keep in mind and to not lose its link to Latvians throughout the world,”  Bērziņš said in the press release.

Among other recommendations to the Legal Affairs committee is support for granting dual citizenship to children born outside of Latvia, even if just one of the parents is a Latvian citizen. This amendment to the Citizenship Law, according to Bērziņš, is one of great interest to the tens of thousands of recent emigrants to Ireland and Great Britain.

Meanwhile, the Zatlers Reform Party (Zatlera Reformu partija) announced Dec. 13 that it will push for an amendment to the Citizenship Law that will automatically grant Latvian citizenship to children born of non-citizens. Under the current law, non-citizen parents can apply for citizenship for their newborn children. While he was still Latvia’s president, party leader Valdis Zatlers in February proposed to the 10th Saeima that the granting of citizenship be automatic, and instead that non-citizen parents could apply to renounce their child’s Latvian citizenship.

“At this time, when individual politicians because of their unrealized political ambitions are ready to split Latvian society, we need more than ever to try to reach mutual trust and understanding,” party spokeswoman Daiga Holma said in a press release. “The situation that more than 20 years after regaining independence we still have non-citizens giving birth to new non-citizens has fostered society’s mutual distrust and resentment.”

About 319,000 residents of Latvia are non-citizens, according to the Office of Citizenship and Migration Affairs (Pilsonības un migrācijas lietu pārvalde, or PMLP).

Support for the diaspora

In another matter, the Cabinet of Ministers in a letter to the Saeima’s Citizenship Law Implementation Committee (Pilsonības likuma izpildes komisija) reiterated the government’s support for the Latvian diaspora, noting that it is one of the goals of the Principles of National Identity, Civil Society and Integration, 2012-2018 (Nacionālās identitātes, pilsoniskās sabiedrības un integrācijas pamatnostādnes 2012.-2018. gadam). The document, drafted by the Ministry of Culture, was approved by the cabinet in October.

Among goals for 2012-2013, according to the letter from Prime Minister Valdis Dombrovskis, is resolving the dual citizenship question, creation of register of citizens, education programs about Latvian culture for children and youths, support for weekend schools, eliminating discrimination in the Latvian labor market against those who do not speak Russian, and organizing summer camps in Latvia.

The national identity document also foresees creation of a board of advisors that would be charged with overseeing progress toward the goals.

The letter from the prime minister also suggests that the diaspora could help foster export markets for Latvian businesses.

In addition, the letter notes, a new Law on Repatriation is being prepared. The current law dates from 1995. According to data from the PMLP, since the law was enacted a total of 5,936 persons have reptriated to Latvia. Under the new law, according to the letter, opportunities for repatriation would be broadened, both for persons who have emigrated, as well as those who were born abroad.

The Foreign Ministry is charged with developing concrete plans for cooperation with the diaspora. Those plans, the letter concludes, are to be submitted to the government by June.

(Updated 13 DEC 2011 with information about Zatlers Reform Party’s proposal.)