From: sorokin@ps1.iaee.tuwien.ac.at (Zhenja)
Subject: Baltic russian-speakers: small people's faith.
Organization: Inst. for General Electrics & Electronics, TU Vienna
Date: Sat, 12 Dec 1992 00:27:32 GMT

The discussion of citizenship's problems in Baltic states in this 
newsgroup has gone too far from the real people. Here is a concrete example, 
that I am witnessing now.

A Jewish young pair from Riga with a 5-year old boy.
She was born in Odessa, he in Kiev (or vice versa, I do not remember).
After finishing a KONSERVATORIA (sorry, do not know english equivalent) 
they lived in Riga about 10 years.He worked as a singer (full classic 
repertoire), she played piano and taught students in Riga KONSERVATORIA.
When it became difficult to get enough funding for everybody, russian-
speakers were first to be fired (naturally).Being musicians of a good level, 
they found job in Vienna (not bad, since Vienna as cultural capital is 
10-100 steps above Riga). They have foreign passports, issued by 
"MID of Latvian SSR"(IMPORTANT!). Now they need to prolongate their 
passports and they come to Latvian consulate. Result: since they are neither 
"ethnic latvians", nor descendants of citizens of Latvian Republic before 
1940, they are no more citizens of Latvia. They haven't got any other 
citzenship, too. To get back to Latvia (passport expires), apply for 
citizenship, learn language and so on will destroy all contracts they have 
and make them unemployed, since they will not find job in Riga. Maybe, they 
could become Ukranian citizens (there are no language requirements), but it 
will definitely last a lot of time, too (because they've got only Latvian 
foreign passport and Soviet passport with PROPISKA in Riga...).
And now, what would you advice them, other than applying for asylim in 
Austria? They have to decide NOW.

Morals.
1) In international practice foreign passport IS AN IDENTIFICATION OF 
CITIZENSHIP OF ITS BEARER. Everywhere in the world they are Latvians, but 
no more in Latvia. Moreover, they are DEPRIVED of their citizenship, being 
abroad. What strong resemblance does it have to the treatment of dissidents 
in 1964..1986...

2) Balts insist to be heirs of 1918..1940 Republics. But they are also heirs 
of "Soviet republics", too, since otherwise all contemporary economic life 
has no legal base. That's why citizenship of Latvian SSR necessarily 
have to be prolonged to the citizenship of Latvian republic. This satatement 
does not apply to the people living in Latvia, since they have only Soviet 
citizenship.

3) Such policy of Latvian ruling circles is a policy of double standard: 
they take everything they benefit from, but try to reject the problems which 
come along. This is a policy of cinical politicians, but not of responsible 
governments and legislators. It is the same, as complaints of Ukraine, which 
did want to have a part of Soviet property abroad and to be treated as heir 
of the USSR along with Russia, but did not want to pay debts. 

4) As usual, the results of current policy are exactly opposite to the aims:
population of the bad-educated and ill-cultured russian-speaking townships 
nearby communist "giants of industry", whom Balts want to push away, will 
not leave, because they haven't got a place to go. To the contrary, such 
people like I mentioned, go away, because they can find a good job 
elsewhere. Could it be the desired effect to get rid of the best people 
(unless you are a communist, of course)?

To my opinion, playing this nationalist game is extremely dangerous to 
Latvians and Estonians. 
First, they create a big part of unloyal population (it was more loyal 
before: remember, how many russian-speakers voted for independance? The 
pair which I was talking about, did it too...). Since the worst days of 
economic crisis are still to come, they are facing Moldavian example: very 
strong influence of pro-soviet elements within russian-speakers. 
Really, if you did not elect this parliament, why should you support its 
activity? The parliament and govt are in the same position: the only support 
they have comes from citizens, and naturally, they  experience a strong 
pressure to solve problems at the expense of scapegoats. This is a fertile 
soil for Nevzorov's and NASHI's.
By the way, I remember that I heard once in August-September, that in 
Latvia only citizens can take part in privatisation. Could anybody comment 
this topic?

Second, their policy of "civilized" ethnic cleansing or "civilized" revenge 
will sooner or later become evident to the international community, and they 
will loose their image of innocent victims of communism, which they used to 
deploit last years with 200% effectiveness.

So, my opinion would be that Balts need to rethink their policy before it is 
too late. They badly need to gain back loyalty of russian-speakers and time 
plays against them now.

Sorokin Zhenya, Vienna, Austria.
Newsgroups: talk.politics.soviet