Forgotten world (37): Latvia

Travelling from north to south, Latvia is the second of the three Baltic states. Like the other two, it was absorbed into the Soviet Union in 1940, regained its independence with the collapse of the USSR in 1991, and became a member of the European Union in 2004.
Latvia has a population of only 2.3 million and its capital is Riga. About a quarter of the population is Russian-speaking and the rights of this section of society have been a bitter issue since independence. Government reforms introduced in 2004 to restrict the use of the Russian language in schools remain controversial.
Since independence, Latvia has had a series of unstable coalition governments with a total of 12 different administrations. Economic growth has been strong but high inflation remains a problem.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 10th, 2006 at 7:22 am and is filed under World current affairs. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.

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