Latvia Warns Against Nazi Veterans March Amid Ukraine Tension
Riga Rally: Latvian veterans of a pro-Nazi group march in Riga. The annual demonstration has taken on new significance with the tension over Russia?s confrontation with Ukraine. Image by getty images
Latvia’s government warned people to avoid an annual march of World War Two Waffen SS veterans through its capital Riga on Sunday, citing tensions over Ukraine.
Many of Latvia’s large Russian-speaking minority say the event distorts history, honours Nazism and insults the victims of the conflict.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s intervention in Ukraine’s Crimea, on the grounds that Russian speakers there need to be protected, has alarmed many in the Baltics. Both Latvia and Estonia have large ethnic Russian minorities whose rights Moscow says are being undermined.
“The Cabinet of Ministers … calls on everyone not to participate in any events,” the government said in a statement, saying the Latvian government wanted to avoid any association with sympathy for Nazism.
Now in their 80s and 90s, the men who joined the armed wing of Adolf Hitler’s Nazi party say they were fighting for Latvian freedom at the end of the war and against the return of the Soviet Red Army.
The veterans, many of whom were forcibly conscripted, say they were front-line troops and did not belong to the part of the SS responsible for killing Jews in the Holocaust.
Before the war, Soviet troops occupied Latvia and thousands were executed or sent to Siberia, many dying.
Latvia was part of the Soviet Union for 50 years before regaining its independence in 1991. It joined the European Union in 2004.
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover. All donations are being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
