What was supposed to happen has happened — on Wednesday, the Saeima Foreign Affairs Committee, after lengthy discussions, supported the bill on Latvia's exit from the Istanbul Convention.
Kyiv Is Not Our Guide!
It should be noted that amendments to the bill were submitted only by opponents of the denunciation of the convention — deputies from "New Unity" and the "Progressives" party. A significant resonance in social media was caused by the proposal of deputy Irma Kalniņa ("New Unity"), which stated: "The Ministry of Foreign Affairs may send a statement to the Secretary General of the Council of Europe about the denunciation of the convention seven days after the law on the denunciation of this Convention is adopted by the Ukrainian parliament as well."
Some parliamentarians and many journalists were puzzled: since when does the Latvian Saeima act according to the decisions of another country's parliament, especially one that is not yet a member of the EU and NATO?" Someone reminded Ms. Kalniņa that, in fact, by giving a solemn promise as a deputy, she committed to uphold the Constitution and laws of Latvia, not the decisions of foreign states.
In any case, this amendment was, of course, rejected, just as the commission deputies rejected proposals... to postpone the adoption of the bill for six months, waiting for some conclusion from the Cabinet regarding the implementation of the program to combat domestic violence...
Let us remind you that in the Saeima Foreign Affairs Committee, supporters of Latvia's exit from the Istanbul Convention hold a significant majority, so the outcome of the vote was clear from the start. And when you read this issue of the newspaper, it is quite possible that the parliamentarians will have already definitively approved the bill on exiting the Istanbul Convention during the plenary session.
The Saeima Divided into Putinists and Anti-Putinists
Credit should be given to the persistence of the opponents of this decision: they threw all their forces and resources into the fight against their opponents. At first, they themselves shouted around the clock that supporters of Latvia's exit from this convention were almost acolytes of the Kremlin or acted in Russia's interests out of misunderstanding.
When this did not help, they had to bring in the "heavy artillery": former president Vaira Vīķe-Freiberga stated that "in my eyes, any Saeima deputy who votes for the denunciation of the Istanbul Convention will appear to be under the influence of Putin's propaganda. The discussion has long ceased to be about the content of the convention itself. We must not fall out of the core of European values!"
Apparently, Lithuania, which did not ratify the convention, has fallen out of this core of values, following the logic of the former president.
During discussions in the Foreign Affairs Committee, its chairwoman Ināra Mūrniece (National Alliance) could not contain herself and accused her opponents, namely the deputies of "New Unity" and the "Progressives" party, of perceiving supporters of exiting the convention as their opponents, as enemies, which, in Ms. Mūrniece's opinion, is completely unacceptable. Just as it is unacceptable to try to label supporters of exiting the convention as Putinists. "We are talking about 60 percent of the deputies!" - noted the head of the Saeima committee.
Is It Only Just Beginning?
If today the majority of deputies vote for Latvia's exit from the convention, it does not mean that opponents of this decision... will calm down. They will still try to convince the president not to proclaim the law and to return it for revision to the Saeima.
If they receive a "signal" from the presidential palace that Rinkēvičs is ready to sign the bill, then plan "B" will be activated - according to the Constitution, if at least 34 Saeima deputies request the president not to proclaim the law, then the signing of the law is suspended for 2 months, during which citizens of the Republic of Latvia can sign in support of launching a referendum on the suspended bill.
Most likely, the opponents of exiting the convention will manage to gather 34 signatures — "New Unity" has 25 votes, and the "Progressives" have 8. Additionally, the independent deputy Skaidrīte Abrahama, who recently left the ranks of the "Progressives," does not support exiting the convention. However, it is unlikely that during the collection of signatures "from the people" it will be possible to gather 155,000 signatures from citizens of the Republic of Latvia for a referendum on this bill.
Rinkēvičs' Difficult Choice
If, however, the opponents of exiting the convention do not make this demarche with the suspension of the law's adoption, then Rinkēvičs will still face a rather difficult task.
On the one hand, he clearly does not support Latvia's exit from the Istanbul Convention and does not want to disappoint the "Progressives" and "New Unity," who voted for his election as head of state.
On the other hand, in 11 months — elections to the Saeima, and it is already clear that in any scenario, conservative forces will be in the majority, and Rinkēvičs has no reason to quarrel with them if he wants to be elected for a second term. And he clearly wants to...
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