“One of the first things we need to change is that we put Russian as part of minority languages,” said Latvian Minister of Culture Agnese Logina in her interview to Artuss Kaimiņš’s “Suņu būda V2.0” programme.
When asked if Russian channels should be in public media, the internet included, the minister said Latvia has a duty to provide information in languages of national minorities, and Russians are a minority that has been in Latvia since before 1938.
Agnese Logina stressed in the interview that she wants to strengthen Latvian language and Latvianness. “There are several ways we can do this, and one that I find very exciting is these Latvian music quotas, because this is a way for us to significantly increase the presence of the Latvian language in the public space. Plus, it would also mean that our artists get more money,” said the minister.
When asked of Latvijas Radio 4, Rus.LSM and LTV7 should have broadcasts in Russian language, Agnese Logina said “unfortunately, they have to for some time, yes”. According to her, the ideological objective is to provide reliable, verified information in different languages that will serve as an alternative to Russian propaganda.
According to A.Kaimiņš, in conditions of this war Latvia should not allow public broadcasting channels in Russian language, it should be taboo.
In addition, none of these channels have a significant audience. The minister of culture acknowledged – the fact that the closure of [public] media content in Russian from 2026 has been put into the Concept of National Security would “complicates life a bit”, because it is not a document that constitutes media policy. “If the National Alliance wanted to do something tangible, they would have done it using media policy guidelines,” said the minister.
“The Ministry of Culture has many instruments to use in order to form a policy, this question of how to strengthen the role of the Latvian language and how to strengthen the diversity of minority content is essentially a question that had to be addressed through the media policy guidelines. This is what I would like to see, more variety,” said the minister. When asked if she thinks about giving more money [to the public media], Agnese Logina said: “Rather, I want to look at what we are doing with the money that we already have, but the fact that we do not have enough money for the media, it is also undeniable.”
In turn, the supervision or control of the printed press, according to the minister, has been handed over to self-regulation and is up to the media themselves. “If we want to be a democratic, independent country, then the press must look after itself. It’s not the politicians who are going to go there and watch.”
Russian movie subtitles will not go away anytime soon either. The minister said they should go away as time goes by. Currently, this [adding Russian subtitles] is in the hands of private persons. “Subtitles are distributed by private persons,” said the minister. “Entrepreneurs always say that demand makes supply. Over time, that demand should go down, and I think that’s what will happen. The simple question is how fast it will be. At the moment, we have a very big problem with the survival of cinema as such, I think specifically about cinema theatres.”
The interview touches on other interesting topics and is available in video format.
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