Vladimir Buzaev, a human rights defender and a member of the Riga City Council on behalf of the Latvian Russian Union political party has managed to ensure that the Saiema has adopted the amendments to the Law on Immigration which made the situation of many Russian citizeins residing in Latvia enforced to apply for their residence permits to be reissued easier.
Vladimir Buzaev has answered questions of the Latvian Russian Union party webportal. The first question was to explain how it is possible to influence the decision-making process without being a parliamentarian. Vladimir Buzaev explains, ”As soon as this 58th article of the Immigration Law was adopted a week before the elections, we immediately realized that it was necessary to “ring the alarm bells,” as it did not correspond to either common sense, the Constitution, or Latvia’s international obligations. However, there were two “sacred cows” that the ruling parties would never slaughter. The first: the Latvian language, which is mandatory for all residents of the country to know, and the second: Russian citizens, whom the authorities deliberately turned into scarecrows. So, in addition to criticizing the law itself, we had to act using other methods that the authorities could still understand, such as sending letters to all state and international authorities”.
Then Vladimir Buzaev explained how they had concluded that processing all applications by the Office of Citizenship and Migration Affairs (UDGM) would take not one year, as stated in the law, but at least five, if not ten years. Their estimations were then submitted to the UDGM (The Office of Citizenship and Immigration of the Republic of Latvia). It was only after this that a special, expedited language attestation procedure was introduced, and amendments to language rules were subjected to public discussion. Vladimir Buzaev says that being a human rights lawyer, he participated in the discussion and voiced his proposals, one of which was accepted which has finally provided people with the option for re-examination.
Additionally, when the UDGM proposed that all citizens of Russia undergo an examination for permanent resident status in the European Union, Vladimir Buzaev stated in a letter that this was not mandated by the law. Two new restrictions were also introduced—having a steady source of income and the obligation of continuous residence in Latvia for five years. He emphasized that these restrictions were additional, and deputies were not inclined to propose them. He also presented statistics proving that the average pension of a Russian citizen is 2.5 times less than the minimum income source. Almost all these people, regardless of whether they passed the language exam or not, could be subject to deportation.
Vladimir Buzaev says, that due to all these steps, by the time when the amendments to the law were tabled there had been a requirement there providing not only for the source of income but also making it possible to consider all people who have any kind of pension benefit to be the EU permanent residents. Vladimir Buzaev states that became possible only thanks to their lobbying.
He then told how he sent to the Saeima Defence Committee three more proposals in April this year when the law was being amended. Vladimir Buzaev tried to ask them to eliminate the demand to prove that a person has a source of income, to eliminate the ban to stay away from Latvia and an additional request to provide those who fail the langiage test with 5-year-long residence permit. All these three proposals were ignored by the Committee, Buzaev says.
Then Vladimir Buzaev together with Julia Sokhina, also a Latvian Russian Union party member, started to send letters and appeals to all international human rights organizations. It was the way how the authorities of Latvia received the same recommendations but from those international organizations. Consequently, all the three proposals which were initially ignored, have become the norms of the law after it was approved in September.
Vladimir Buzaev says, ”So, even without being in the Parliament, we do influence the law-making process. It just requires a sincere desire to change the situation, rather than using it solely for self-promotion”. Vladimir Buzaev regrets that another importan proposal he tried to push for which would legalize Russian citizens who showed no activity and did not submit any documents before August 31 was not accepted. He points out that the government proposed the same, but both its suggestions and Buzaev´s were turned down. He concludes, ”I doubt that international bodies, which insisted on their adoption, will be satisfied with this outcome”.
