A report is required every year, and now the next one has arrived – for 2023.
What did you spend 35,770 euros on?
Such funding was appropriated last year to study the dramatic pages of the history of the 20th century. The leading areas of the commission’s work are:
1. Calculation of losses caused to the national economy of Latvia;
2. Determination of demographic damage in Latvia;
3. Calculation of damage caused to the Latvian environment;
4. Determination of damage caused to Latvia as a result of the activities of the military-industrial complex of the USSR;
5. Development of a legal basis for drawing up claims against the respondent state.
The latter part of the work is carried out in accordance with the joint declaration of the Ministers of Justice of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia of November 5, 2015, which requires “an appropriate assessment of the occupation of the Baltic States at the international level.” The calculation methodology must be “scientifically based”.
Where is Latvia’s gold?
The scientists’ new topic was: “Destruction of the financial system of the Republic of Latvia (equating the lat to the ruble and subsequent devaluation, destruction of securities, etc.) in 1940–1941.” Based on the data available in the archives, a picture emerges of the “takeover and plunder” of banks and savings and loan societies by the Soviet authorities, which “provides additional information about the losses inflicted on the Latvian state and residents in the first year of the occupation of the USSR.”
As a means of revaluing Soviet rubles, Latvian scientists used the ratio of gold prices at official rates, subsequently converting it into euros.
The current chairman of the Commission, a historian from the Vidzeme High School, Gatis Krumins, previously stated in the media that purchasing power in Latvia at the end of the 1930s was 15 times higher than in the USSR.
“Russian military personnel and officials here felt like millionaires. They bought goods by the box and sent them to the USSR by the wagons. Already in the spring of 1941, there was a shortage of food in Latvia. In fact, it was legal plunder. When the Germans came, they did the same. This a classic look at how occupying states act in occupied territories: they introduce a disproportionately low exchange rate.”
After World War II, a 10:1 exchange of rubles followed in 1947. “This reform hit the Baltic states the hardest, because we still had peasant farms, and although not many, private workshops remained.”
In the last period of the existence of the socialist economy, states G. Krumins, collective and state farms of the Latvian SSR received subsidies from the budget, which was formed primarily from oil and gas exports. Thus, for milk, a liter of which retailed for 22 kopecks, producers received 55 kopecks. At the same time, “no standards were in force in agriculture, and no one talked about eco-products at all.”
“The villagers kept rubles in cans, but not because they lived well. There was simply no place to spend this money. They had no cover. Thus, everything had no meaning. What did we get? Only a polluted environment and many visitors.”
According to Gatis Krumins: “Throughout the occupation, the needs of the USSR army were covered by Latvian money. What remained from above was invested in other republics of the USSR.”
By the way, as Mr. Krumins said in his interviews, to prepare the materials that now form the basis of Latvia’s claims against Russia, he used the archives available to national historians… of the Russian Federation!
There is work for historians
The work of the commission caused a surge of creative enthusiasm in the historical community of the Republic of Latvia – a total of 100 works were received from various authors. The task of the commission was to arrange them accordingly, provide reference apparatus, graphic material, etc.
As a result of the work of the commission, the collection “Arbitrariness of Power. Lawlessness and Crimes of the Repressive Bodies in Latvia in 1944–1953” also appeared. The Latvian State Archive and the Ministry of Internal Affairs archive are involved here, from where they obtained information about “illegal arrests, torture, murders and other types of terrible crimes.” The 184-page book was published in a circulation of 1,000 copies, of which 800 are distributed through the National Library of Latvia to libraries throughout the country. A brochure “The role of the USSR state budget in the colonial policy of the USSR in occupied Latvia (1940–1990)” was also published.
The commission continued to work on the website okupacijaszaudejumi.lv, the time frame of which is indicated, by the way, 1939–1991 – thereby including in the era both part of the time when the Republic of Lithuania was still a de jure sovereign state and a member of the League of Nations, and the period after the official restoration of independence.
The commission’s materials also reflected the personal impressions of various figures of the past. In particular, in 2023, international journalist Voldemars Hermanis and Latvian Radio employee Daria Jushkevicha shared their memoirs. On the website okupacijaszaudejumi.lv you can also find a video of the speech of the Member of the European Parliament Inese Vaidere. In it, she mentions, in particular, that in the period before World War II, Latvia surpassed Czechoslovakia, Finland and Italy in terms of living standards, occupying 12th place in Europe. Latvia’s per capita production of oil exceeded that of the USSR by 10 times, slate and cotton fabrics by 5–6 times, cement, knitwear and electricity by 2 times.
According to Ms. Vaidere, if it were not for the Soviet occupation, the standard of living in Latvia in 1990 would have been twice as high, and in 2000 – three times higher. Nevertheless, some material phenomena would not have taken place: for example, Lenin State University student Inese would not have received the Lenin scholarship…
We need to find facts of Russification
The Commission’s plans for 2024 include the publication of the collection “Russification of Latvia in 1940–1990.” These materials refer to “the purposeful policy of Russification of Latvia and its negative social consequences,” the latter “continuing to cause negative processes in modern society in Latvia.”
True, not all materials have yet been collected: “It is necessary to obtain information about the discrimination of the Latvian language during both Soviet occupations until 1991 in education, republican institutions, the linguistic environment and everyday use of the language.” “The long-term consequences of linguistic discrimination,” the Commission argues, are still being felt today.
However, when the Commission’s materials seriously study the factors of demographic damage in Latvia in Soviet times, such as: “severation of family ties; potentially possible, but not consummated marriages; decrease in the birth rate (potentially unborn children)”, then a latent desire arises to apply this methodology to the last three decades of independence. But who is to blame in this regard?
BILLIONS
According to commission data, calculated in Soviet rubles, in 1940–1941. Latvia lost 15.8 billion; in 1945–1988 – 25.6 billion.
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2024-04-08 13:10:48