Former Riga City Council member Aleksejs Ros\u013cikovs, who fled to Belarus, plans to return to Latvia after the parliamentary election scheduled for this autumn, Svetlana \u010culkova, chairwoman of the board of the political party Stabilit\u0101tei! (For Stability!), told the LETA news agency.<\/p>\n
Ros\u013cikovs is running second on the party\u2019s Riga candidate list. According to \u010culkova, he will return to Latvia on 4 October to \u201cimmediately resume political work together with the party team.\u201d<\/p>\n
Asked whether Ros\u013cikovs would return even if Stabilit\u0101tei! (For Stability!) fails to win seats in the 15th Saeima, \u010culkova did not give a direct answer, saying the party does not consider it possible that it would fail to secure the required 5% of the vote.<\/p>\n
Ros\u013cikovs said the election is \u201cnot the finish line, but the beginning of a new stage.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOn 4 October I will be back in Latvia to continue working for our voters. Our team has a clear vision and the determination to defend people\u2019s interests through concrete action rather than empty promises,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The party stressed that, regardless of the election outcome, its priority will remain active work for society, regular dialogue with residents and the consistent implementation of its programme. Stabilit\u0101tei! (For Stability!) said Ros\u013cikovs\u2019 return would mark the beginning of the party\u2019s next phase of work, focused on representing voters\u2019 interests and delivering practical solutions to issues important to the country.<\/p>\n
As previously reported, the party\u2019s lead candidates for the 15th Saeima election are Svetlana \u010culkova, P\u0101vels Kuzmins, Nat\u0101lija Mar\u010denko-Jodko, Ludmila Rjazanova and Igors Orlovs.<\/p>\n
Earlier this year, several lawmakers \u2014 Dmitrijs Kovo\u013cenko, I\u013cja Ivanovs, Igors Judins and Amils Sa\u013cimovs \u2014 left Stabilit\u0101tei! (For Stability!), causing the party\u2019s parliamentary faction to dissolve after it fell below the minimum requirement of five MPs. \u010culkova said the remaining four lawmakers continue to work in parliament as independent deputies.<\/p>\n
It has also been reported that at the end of May, Riga City Council revoked Ros\u013cikovs\u2019 council mandate after he failed to attend more than half of the council meetings over a three-month period.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the Riga City Court in the Latgale District amended the pre-trial security measure imposed on Ros\u013cikovs, ordering his detention after he had left for Belarus.<\/p>\n
The request was submitted by prosecutor Kaspars Andru\u0161kins during a court hearing in the criminal case in which Ros\u013cikovs is charged with inciting national hatred.<\/p>\n
The court also declared Ros\u013cikovs wanted and suspended the proceedings until he is located.<\/p>\n
Ros\u013cikovs has acknowledged that he is in Belarus. He said he failed to appear in court and did not return to Latvia because he feared for his life, claiming he had received telephone threats from individuals who threatened to \u201ccut off his head.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to Ros\u013cikovs, the State Security Service (VDD) offered him the opportunity to live in a safe house for six months, but he declined because he did not want to wait for the threats against him to be carried out.<\/p>\n
Ros\u013cikovs is charged with inciting national and ethnic hatred. He maintains that the criminal case against him is politically motivated.<\/p>\n
Read also: BNN Focus | Latvia\u2019s party ratings: Anger or turnout?<\/a><\/p>\n Follow us on\u00a0Facebook<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0X<\/a>!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Riga City Council member Aleksejs Ros\u013cikovs, who fled to Belarus, plans to return to Latvia after the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3473,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[938],"class_list":["post-3472","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-featured"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/belarus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3472","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/belarus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/belarus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/belarus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/belarus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3472"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/belarus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3472\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/belarus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3473"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/belarus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3472"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/belarus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3472"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/belarus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3472"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}