On the eve of the Bucharest meeting of the leaders of NATO's eastern flank, Putin has come out with yet more ruminations on history and fantasies about his place in today's world. To call a spade a spade, he openly threatens Latvia, the Baltics and the whole world.
Optimistic headlines announce the government's decision - Latvia will finally move to an education system in the national language only. Kārlis Šadurskis, a political activist of the Unity (Vienotība) party and former Minister of Education, writes: "The work I started in 2004 has finally been successfully completed." Is it really completed?
When in 2014 the then German Chancellor Angela Merkel, after a conversation with Putin, complained to then US President Barack Obama that "our friend" Vladimir was living in a parallel reality, no one in the West, including here, even thought to examine Merkel's phrase through the prism of "critical thinking".
On Thursday, the Saeima blocked the third reading of the Civil Union Law, but this does not mean that the issue is off the table. It will be put back on the agenda again and again, trying to get it through by whatever means.
After a month of discussions, the EU's sixth sanctions package has finally been adopted. It would be more correct to write "after a month of fumbling", but let's stick to the principle - better late than never.
On the last day of May, US President Joe Biden published a programmatic piece in the guest column of The New York Times on the US position on the Russia-Ukraine war. The title of the article says a lot: "What America will and will not do in Ukraine".
On Thursday, the Saeima was addressed by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who stressed that "we must restore full respect for the fundamental values on our continent. We must fight absolutely clearly and at all levels for the principle: every nation matters".
Henry Kissinger, once a superstar of diplomacy, at the age of 98 (he turns 99 today), spoke at the Davos Economic Forum with his proposal for a solution to the Ukraine war.
Yale University professor Timothy Snyder's article "We should say it. Russia is fascist" in the influential The New York Times was a worldwide sensation.
The world is not ready for a "new era of risk", according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute's (SIPRI) annual report "Environment of Peace" on the level of threats to global peace, published yesterday.
This week saw a kind of phase transition in Latvian politics. Climbing one level lower. The National Alliance (Nacionālā apvienība) called on the Prime Minister to sack a minister unsuitable for the post, which the Prime Minister, in the words of the Speaker of the Saeima, did not object to, but at the same time sacked another minister against whom no one had any complaints.
Olga Skabeyeva, one of Russia's most vocal propagandists (she seems to be deliberately imitating the evil SS characters from Soviet-era films), on her program responded in mock astonishment to pro-Kremlin military commentator Mikhail Khodarenok's remark that they are left alone against the whole world: but what about China? India? Don't they count?
Yesterday, Interior Minister Marija Golubeva announced her resignation in the following words: "Prime Minister Kariņš, bowing to the pressure of the nationalist ultimatum, has decided not to support me. This will be my last day as Interior Minister."
Finnish President Sauli Niinistö and Prime Minister Sanna Marin have issued an official statement on the immediate accession to NATO. The Finnish Parliament is expected to approve the request on Sunday and a document will be submitted to NATO. Sweden is also expected to follow suit in the coming days.
The world is fond of repeating what Angela Merkel, the former Chancellor of Germany, once said: that Putin, the master of the Kremlin, has lost touch with his surroundings and lives in a parallel reality. All the signs are that this is the case, but it seems that he is not the only one living in a parallel reality. So is French President Emmanuel Macron.
The world is currently facing the most serious existential threat in the history of humanity. The nuclear power Russia, which has some 6,000 nuclear warheads in its arsenal, is openly threatening to use nuclear weapons if "anyone thinks of interfering and disrupting its strategic plans".
After the sinking of the Russian missile cruiser Moskva, I wrote that "signs from above" pointed to the inevitability of the defeat of the Russian army. Now these "signs" have taken on a quite practical, financial form.
Yesterday, NATO and a few invited defense ministers from other countries held a meeting on Ukrainian defense issues (arms supplies) at the US military base in Ramstein, Germany. On the eve of this meeting, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov threatened World War III in a very peculiar environment (see picture).
The French presidential election ended with no surprises. The incumbent Emmanuel Macron (for the first time in 20 years, a French President was re-elected for a second term) convincingly defeated Marine Le Pen with 58.6% of the vote.
People only realize the significance of what is happening after the fact. This is the case both in everyday life and in big politics. At the moment, the significance of the war in Ukraine is poorly grasped by people outside the immediate war zone. This is also reflected in the main topics debated by the two candidates before the French presidential elections on Sunday.
Historians say that World War II was a continuation of World War I. The current Russia-Ukraine war is a kind of continuation of World War II. Why? Because the main propaganda narrative of the aggressor state is to fight the Nazis, who were never truly defeated.