News

Riga, 18/10/2013. Today, on the Anti Human Trafficking Day of the European Union, the topicality of the problem within the global and Baltic States was emphasized in the press conference organized by the Ombudsman’s Office and the Society “Shelter “Safe House””. The participants pointed out that each Baltic State does their best to combat this contemporary form of slavery.

Ombudsman of Latvia Mr. Juris Jansons from 3rd till 5th October takes part in International conference "The observance of children's rights to family habitation. Analysis of the existing situation in the Republic of Moldova through the best practices of other countries" in Chişinău, Moldova.

9th National Smeinar of the European Network of Ombudsmen was held in Dublin, Ireland, from 15-17 September 2013.

Ombudsman of the Republic of Latvia has published his Annual report on the year 2012.

Ombudsman of the Republic of Latvia sent the letter about enforcement of human rights in Latvia to European institutions (European Council, European Parliament and European Commision).

Ombudsman of the Republic of Latvia was invited to the International Janusz Korczak seminar in Geneva. Mr. Juris Jansons also led a presentation about the availability of free education in Latvia.

This was the second year when Annual workshop for Baltic countries Ombudsman's on Children Rights was organized. This workshop took place in Riga, from 21 to 22 March 2013. Previous year hosting country of the workshop was Estonia.

Ombudsman’s Office of the Republic of Latvia has conducted about 30 inspection visits to long-term social care and rehabilitation institutions covering all regions of Latvia.

When assessing the contents of applications filed with the Ombudsman’s Office in the area of social and economical rights, Ombudsman has identified that applications are filed with increased frequency also from employed people, rather than the groups of population subject to special protection, such as retired persons, disabled persons or continuously unemployed persons. Basically, it is the same question asked by latvian people: how they can survive in Latvia when the income amounts to the minimum salary fixed by the Government? The income of such people often exceeds by a couple of lats the minimum required to qualify for the status of needy or low-income person; therefore, they have no access to social aid from municipality either.

Notwithstanding the information provided by the Latvian government about rapid recovery of the national economy, improvement in economic indicators, that for the third quarter in a row Latvia is the fastest growing economy in the EU, social reality and statistical data suggest that the economic stress is still felt by more than one half of the Latvian population, in the regions of Vidzeme and Latgale even 76.4 to 77.7% households. Data suggest that economic stress in the households is not weakened, by contrast, keeps growing. 40% of the Latvian population including 43% of children and 33% of pensioners are exposed to the risk of poverty and social exclusion. These are just some of statistic data. All information may be found in full report on the risk of poverty in Latvia.