Latvia’s integration secretariat has renewed a call to Latvians and Livonians abroad to participate in a survey about repatriation. The survey, coordinated by the Rīga-based consulting firm SIA Aksedo, is focused on Latvians and Livonians in Australia, Brazil, Canada, Germany, Great Britain, Ireland, Russia and the United States.

The consulting firm seeks at least 1,000 responses, according to Dana Heiberga of the Secretariat of the Special Assignments Minister for Social Integration Affairs (Īpasu uzdevumu ministra sabiedrības integrācijas lietās sekretāriats, or ĪUMSILS).

The survey aims at learning about respondents’ ties to Latvia, their opinions about the image of Latvia and their thoughts on barriers to repatriation, the secretariat announced in a May 21 press release. Also addressed in the survey are questions about maintenance of Latvian and Livonian identity abroad, plus how institutions in Latvia might support that maintenance.

The integration secretariat expects to use the survey results to help it develop programs for supporting ethnic Latvian and Livonian communities abroad, as well as to work on policies to aid those who do wish to repatriate.

SIA Aksedo was awarded an LVL 8,750 contract to complete the survey. ĪUMSILS asks anyone contacted by the consulting firm to cooperate with the survey, Heiberga said.

The survey also may be completed online, either in English at aksedo.e-formas.lv/forms/381 or in Latvian at aksedo.e-formas.lv/forms/370.

Latvia’s costumed singing act Pirates of the Sea has it made through to the finals of this year’s Eurovision Song Contest. The Latvian entry, singing “Wolves of the Sea,” was one of 10 countries to advance from their May 22 semi-finals in Belgrade, Serbia.

Latvia will compete with 24 other countries in the final scheduled May 24 in Belgrade. The competition will be aired live on television stations across Europe and also will be available for viewing over the Internet.

In all, 43 countries have entries in the contest. Four of them—France, Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom—were automatically in the final because of their population. Serbia, which won last year’s contest, also had a spot reserved in the final. The remaining 38 countries were split into two groups competing in semi-finals May 20 and 22. A combination of televoting and jury decisions determined which 10 countries from each semi-final got to go on to the final.

Neither Estonia or Lithuania made it out of the semi-finals.

The winner of the May 24 final will be determined by telephone and text message voting across 45 countries, including all of Europe, Turkey and Israel.

Latvia first participated in the Eurovision Song Contest in 2000. That year, pop-rock group Brainstorm took third place. Two years later in Tallinn, Estonia, pop singer Marija Naumova won the contest. As a result, the 2003 contest took place in Latvia. Last year, Latvia’s six-man, Italian-singing Bonaparti.lv finished 16th.

The Italian-born Roberto Meloni, one of the members of Bonaparti.lv, is the driving force behind this year’s entry from Latvia. Pirates of the Sea also includes radio and television moderator Jānis Vaišļa and dancer Aleksandra Kurusova. The song “Wolves of the Sea” was written by Jonas Liberg, Johan Sahlen, Claes Andreasson and Torbjörn Wassenius, all of Sweden.

Further information on the song contest is available by visiting www.eurovision.tv.

All Soviet-era highly enriched uranium has been removed from Latvia, part of an effort by the United States and Russia to reduce the threat of nuclear proliferation and terrorism, the Washington, D.C.-based National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) has announced.

The NNSA, part of the U.S. Department of Energy, announced May 16 that 14.4 kilograms (nearly 30 pounds) of the uranium was taken from the Salaspils Research Reactor in Latvia to a nuclear facility near Chelyabinsk, Russia, not far from Kazakhstan.

“With this shipment of highly enriched uranium spent nuclear fuel, NNSA has completed the removal of all HEU from Latvia,” NNSA Administrator Thomas D’Agostino said in a press release. “This cooperative effort to secure dangerous nuclear material will help reduce the threat of nuclear proliferation and prevent nuclear terrorism.”
 
In May 2005, NNSA worked with Russian authorities to remove three kilograms of highly enriched uranium from Latvia.

The Salaspils Research Reactor began operation in 1961 at Salaspils, near Rīga. It was the only civilian nuclear research facility in the Baltic republics. Disassembly of the facility began in 2002, according to Latvia’s Environment State Bureau.

Removal of the spent nuclear fuel is part of the Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism, a U.S.-Russian program launched in 2006. Latvia is the third country to return Soviet-origin nuclear fuel to Russia, the NNSA said. Uzbekistan and the Czech Republic also have completed removal.

The American agency also is working with Latvian authorities to improve detection of illicit shipments of nuclear and other radioactive materials. The NNSA has helped train Latvian border guards and has installed radiation detection devices at border crossings, airports and seaports.