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Latvia-Lithuania: Will There Be a Territorial Dispute? (Exclusive)

In Latvia, with the initiative of ex-deputy of the Jurmala City Council Janis Kuzins signatures for the "return of the Lithuanian resort city Palanga to the Republic of Latvia" has started to be collected. However, no response has been received either from Latvian or Lithuanian society.

It should be recalled that until 1921 Palanga was the territory of Latvia, but was transferred to Lithuania, to ensure access to the sea for the latter. The author of the initiative stressed that in 1923, Lithuania received Klaipeda region, which provided the country access to the sea, but Palanga was not returned to Latvia. Now Palanga's return to Latvia Kuzins considers fair and beneficial for his country.

"If Palanga is returned to Latvia, our country would benefit. In this case, we will acquire oil reserves in the Baltic Sea and will become energy independent and have another resort city," Kuzins said, RIA Novosti reports.

The collection of signatures is carried out in a portal of public initiatives manabalss.lv in Latvia. Within 21 days of the initiative only 98 people voted. If it is supported by 10 thousand people, it will be passed to the consideration of Latvian Saeima. The initiative, however, is not very popular in Latvia, and analysts exclude the possibility of the Baltic republics' territorial claims to each other.

"At the moment all the questions regarding Latvian territory are closed. Neither society, nor the ruling elites demand the review of the borders. Therefore, the idea of the return of Palanga is not meaningful to discuss. At the same time the sources of such an initiative are quite clear: in the current unstable geopolitical situation the calls for the need of redrawing state boundaries are becoming more and more," Latvian political analyst Andrei Starikovs said in an interview with "Armedia" IAA. He also reminded about the information on the creation of a new autonomous entity - Latgale People's Republic, eastern territories in Latvia with Russian-speaking population - that appeared at the beginning of 2015 in the Latvian media. Starikovs stressed that this is a marginal idea and remained at the level of unverified information. The analyst pointed out that, despite some reaction from the Russian media, the initiative of the "return of Palanga" has not entered onto the domestic political agenda and generally stayed unnoticed by the Latvian society.

In an interview with "Armedia" IAA political scientist, journalist Alexander Nosovich also talked about the impossibility of territorial contradictions. "Territorial disputes between Latvia and Lithuania is almost impossible: both countries are components of the pro-American buffer zone, conduct a common foreign policy in the EU that is against Russia. As Latvia's presidency in the European Union and the Riga summit of the Eastern Partnership confirmed, the Latvian foreign policy is conducted with an eye to the Lithuanian. Therefore, the conflict between the two republics for Palanga is from the series of science fiction,” Nosovich said.

He also noted that Latvia is the only country that gave Lithuanian some territory. "In studying the history of Lithuania of the twentieth century, one finds out that a third of its present territory was literally granted as a gift. Palanga was given by Latvia during the interwar period of the first independence, so as its neighbor had access to the sea. With Stalin’s agreement in 1939, Lithuania got Vilnius region together with the city Vilnius - the most important city for Lithuanian statehood, the ancient capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, which before belonged to Poland and was called Wilno. As a result of the Second World War, Stalin gave the German Memel to Lithuanian SSR - one of the largest commercial ports in the Baltic Sea, renamed Lithuanians Klaipeda. It simultaneously affirmed the old border of Lithuania, including its right to Palanga. So I'll freely say that none of the 15 republics of the Soviet Union came out from the Soviet Union with more gains, than Lithuania,” Nosovich said.

Both analysts highlighted the personality of the author of the initiative. "The return of Palanga to Latvia is a public initiative of the former deputy of Jurmala City Council Janis Kuzins. The political leadership of the country has nothing to do with the collection of signatures, so the initiative has no future" Nosovich said.

The analyst from Latvia, in turn, stressed that the initiative is rather an attempt of an activist from Latvia to remind of himself. "It is necessary to pay attention to the author of the initiative. The one, who calls to collect signatures is quite radical opposition activist Janis Kuzins - a person permanently involved in various political scandals. Recently Mr. Kuzin rarely appears in public, and, apparently, his gamble with Palanga is nothing but an attempt to remind about himself with a manner peculiar to Kuzins," Starikovs said.

Today both Latvia and Lithuania are EU Member States, and to talk about the possibility of new territorial disputes within the EU, at least today, is not realistic. On the other hand, the Soviet Union redevided boundaries, which left a lot of open questions, that at some period in the history cause new crisis and territorial disputes. Raising the problem of Palanga during the period of strained relations between the EU and Russia, cannot be by chance during this period of anti-Russian moods in Baltics...

 


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