Speech by Foreign Minister Krišjānis Kariņš at the annual Foreign Policy Debate in the Latvian Parliament (Saeima) 25 January 2024

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Mr President, Madame Speaker, Madame Prime Minister, Members of Parliament, Colleagues, Ministers, Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,

Let me begin my address with words of gratitude and so that they are not heard at the very end, let them come the first.

Let me thank the entire foreign service, the Foreign Ministry, our ambassadors, for their tireless work in representing the interests of our country internationally. My thanks go to the President of Latvia, the Prime Minister, the Speaker of the Saeima, the Chair and members of the Foreign Affairs Committee and all the Members of the Saeima for their collective and coordinated effort in representing our country at any visit and discussion where we are present.

I want to express appreciation and note that our society, no matter how divided we may sometimes be on different issues, whether it concerns tax policy or how to better sort out health care, we are united in foreign policy, the way it has been for the past two years in support of Ukraine. This sets an example to the whole Western world. Recently, the Ukrainian President also acknowledged that during his visit to Riga as he thanked our people, the Saeima and the Government for their support.

When we stand united, we have tremendous power. We have that unity in foreign policy, let’s keep it going. You all have the report[*], which you have had a chance to become acquainted, and I’m not going to repeat it. I will highlight a number of things from the report. 

We need to be aware that war is back in Europe. A year and 11 months have passed, soon it will be two years, since Russia has been waging an unprovoked and brutal attack on its neighbour, Ukraine, with the aim of obliterating Ukraine as a state. It is an imperialist war with the overarching goal of putting an end to the rules-based world order, and replacing it with the rule of brutal force.

Right now, Russia is trying in various ways with its propaganda to convince us in Latvia and the rest of the Western world that we are divided, that we are powerless, that the war is going forward, that Russia will win it, and that resistance makes no sense. And let me tell you, this is no more than a lie and nonsense. We are neither divided nor powerless in the way we are being told.

We, Latvia, stand with our Western allies and we still have work to do, work which is absolutely within our power – to help Ukraine win this war. Ukraine can win this war, and for this, Ukraine needs our undivided support. It is possible, and it is also possible to contain Russia after this war so that it never attacks anyone anywhere in Europe.

It is not inevitable that there would be a wider-scale war in Europe; it is within our powers to stop it by strengthening our security together with our Western allies. Let’s ignore Russian propaganda, let’s be self-assured and confident in our abilities.

Now let us take an even broader focus. The wider global context is turbulent. While there is Russia’s war in Ukraine, which we all know about, there is also Israel’s war with Hamas on the Gaza Strip. And we see that this war is beginning to spill over and that Iran looms behind all the turmoil, activating larger-scale hostilities through its proxies Hamas, the Houthis in Yemen and Hezbollah in Lebanon. On the Gaza Strip, Israel is trying to wipe out the Hamas terrorist organization, which attacked Israel unprovoked, on 7 October 2023. Meanwhile, the Houthis from Yemen are now firing missiles at commercial vessels in an attempt to disrupt shipping routes in the Red Sea, and the Hezbollah from Lebanon is also shelling Israeli positions, thus creating the need for Israel to keep its north safe.

From the very beginning of the conflict, Latvia had unequivocally supported Israel’s right to exist as a free and democratic state and its right to defend itself. At the same time, we believe that the Palestinians must be given the opportunity to establish their own independent state, because only in this way can lasting peace be achieved. This is not a contradictory position – to support Israel and, at the same time, to support the creation of a Palestinian state in order to achieve peace. This war brings further instability by disrupting shipping through the Red Sea and supply chains are also hindered, which could result in higher prices over time.

This is not the only conflict. If we look at Sub-Saharan Africa, at the Sahel region, where various juntas related to terrorist organisations have emerged in a number of countries, a very active and sustained involvement and influence of Russia’s Wagner Group can be observed. Hence, yet another very restless region.

When we look further east, we see that tensions between China and Taiwan do not abate. Taiwan recently held a presidential election, the winner being a candidate who does not want a rapid unification with China. In addition to that, even more acute tensions are building between China and the United States, which is Latvia’s main strategic partner. The tension between China and Taiwan can affect the entire world, say, in the area of trade – the South China Sea is more significant in terms of trade than the Red Sea, and any blockades in the South China Sea could have a negative impact.

Now, let me repeat – Russia in Ukraine, Hamas, Iran, Israel in the Middle East, the Sahel region in Africa, then China and Taiwan. The environment is turbulent. I would like to assert that as a country, by shaping our foreign and domestic policies wisely, we can continue to safeguard our freedom, democracy and security. In such a way, the main topics we are going to debate here, at the Saeima will be how to improve one, the other or the third service. This is completely possible.

What have we done so far as a country to strengthen our security? 20 years ago, Latvia joined two very important international organisations – the European Union and NATO. Since the moment of our accession, our membership in these organisations has been the basis for our economy to continue developing and for us to live in peace and security. This is the foundation of everything. This will not change in our foreign policy as we move ahead.

Our active participation in the EU and the NATO alliance, not as a little brother but as a fully equal member, is based on the principle – protect yourself and your friends will come to your aid. But first and foremost, we must protect ourselves. And then we can ask the question: are we doing our part? The answer is unequivocally yes, we are.

Ever since 2019, year after year – this is already our sixth consecutive budget – we have devoted over 2% of GDP to our defence. All NATO members have now made a commitment of the minimum 2% target. This year, you who are in the Saeima, have approved 2.4% of GDP for our defence. We’ll be moving towards 3%. We are investing financially in our security.

But what do we do with that money? We are buying anti-aircraft defence equipment, coastal defence equipment and missile artillery, which will greatly strengthen our own security. The first contracts have already been signed. Our National Defence Service continues to evolve. Two drafts a year, whereby we build up the number of our fully equipped reserves. And that is the idea of the National Defence Service. Namely, upon its introduction, the number of trained reserve troops will grow over the years. This will be a significant increase in our armed forces.

We are also investing in our military infrastructure. Not only do we have Camp Ādaži, the largest military base in the Baltic States, and the airbase at Lielvārde, but decisions have been made and money earmarked in the budget to develop the Selonia Military Training Area. It will be about twice as large as the one in Ādaži, where not only our armed forces, but also our NATO allies will be able to undergo training. As a NATO country, we are doing everything we need to do. The point is not to stray away from that path. And we have to stop telling ourselves all sorts of horror stories: woe is me... We are moving on step by step, everything is being put in place, let’s just hold the course.

At the same time, not only has Latvia strengthened itself, but NATO Allies have together reinforced the entire eastern flank, including Latvia in particular. The NATO Battle Group in Latvia is led by Canada, to which, taking this opportunity, I would like to express my warm appreciation and gratitude for bringing together soldiers from ten countries to work in an integrated battle unit under its leadership. This demonstrates the ability of NATO troops from various countries to successfully operate together. Under Canadian leadership, it has been achieved.

But not only do we have the Canadian-led forces, Denmark and our main strategic partner, the United States of America, have also sent their troops to our country. The US combat teams in which some troops practice, work together with us, then leave, to be immediately replaced by others. Their permanent presence is not theoretical or on paper, it is actually happening here.

Last summer, at the NATO Vilnius Summit, we adopted the new NATO defence plans, which fully include Latvia. This means that what generals have already developed has been confirmed at a political level – how, if needed, we will come to each other’s aid, how the armed forces will be deployed, how supplies will reach us, and how reinforcements will arrive. Those plans have been adopted and various kinds of exercises are now being held, and will be held in future; the largest NATO exercises involving some 90,000 troops over a longer period of time have just been announced.

Canada has taken a decision to commit budget funds so as to go from the battalion to the brigade level. We see on the ground: tank units have already arrived in Latvia, artillery is already there, the number of troops is increasing. Canada is building its muscle here, and so are the other countries in the battle group.

We do our part and NATO does what it has to do. If anyone thinks – what is going to happen now – that is not how this works! The military have their plans in place. The point is for us civilians and politicians not to meddle needlessly with things which we may not have a full understanding of. Let’s give support, contribute funds, ask questions, what we are going to do and how you are going to act in one case or another. Starting with the NATO Supreme Allied Commander in Belgium, through the command structure and units in Latvia – the plans are there, they have been developed, they are now being implemented. Say, we have air defence equipment purchased, contracts signed, troops will be trained, and then the units will arrive here. So, Latvia is doing its part, NATO is doing its part, and we are not alone. That is what keeps us safe.

Next – what our foreign policy objectives are from a future perspective.

The first and unwavering objective remains our full support for Ukraine so that it could win this war. Our civil society continues to support Ukraine very actively, and with as much enthusiasm and as vigorously as a year ago, as a year and a half ago. The government continues to do so, too, as reflected in another decision it took this week to send aid to Ukraine.

We channel about 1% of our GDP towards supporting Ukraine. It is quite clear that if all of Europe devoted 1% of its gross domestic product in support of Ukraine, Ukraine’s biggest logistics problem would be how to use that aid. We shall keep asserting: you need not be rich to help, but you must have will and determination. This is the case with Latvia. We shall continue to urge our partners to follow the lead.

Next, we have a consistent and robust policy on sanctions against Russia and Belarus, where we need to put more emphasis on tackling the risks of circumventing sanctions. The biggest risk in the world is that different types of technology, which are not directly sanctioned, nonetheless end up one way or the other in Russia and its military industry.

What we will have to do in the sanctions policy in Europe is to demand manufacturers who produce goods and technologies for military use to obtain export certificates. I will explain so that you understand the simple idea: when Latvia decided to send our Stinger anti-aircraft equipment to Ukraine before 24 February 2022, the beginning of the war, there were a couple of months between the political decision and the actual shipment of weapons, because consent to this decision had to be obtained from the country of origin, the United States. The United States eventually agreed to send weapons, but it took time. If there are such procedures in place to transfer armament to the Allies, then we can set up similar procedures for manufacturers, making them to establish where their products end up and that they will not end up in specific countries. That is, in that supply chain, manufacturers would also have their responsibility.

We shall call Russia to account. We insist on there being a special tribunal to prosecute all war criminals: from soldiers who have shot and raped civilians, to military command and political leadership who have set the entire military machine in motion.

The Western world has yet to agree on how such a tribunal should be established. This is one of the main goals of our foreign policy: to achieve not only a tougher and more effective sanctions policy, but also that Russia would answer for what they are doing in Ukraine, which is not only inhumane but also completely illegal.

In our foreign policy, these two pillars, the European Union and NATO, will remain central. We will continue to work actively to strengthen the European Union and NATO.

For the European Union, enlargement will be the challenge over the next five years. A political decision has been taken to open accession negotiations with Ukraine and Moldova. Georgia has been granted candidate status. Bosnia and Herzegovina, if it implements certain reforms, could also gain the candidate status. There are several more countries who aspire to join. Our country’s position is – we want a wider European Union. We are in favour of the enlargement of the European Union because we are convinced that, firstly, it will strengthen our security. Secondly, in terms of economy, it also brings huge opportunities for our exporters. When Ukraine and Moldova join, the money will also move in that direction. This is money that will also go to suppliers, namely, to manufacturers, exporters from Latvia. That’s our chance. Just like Latvia’s accession to the European Union has benefited the German economy, by the same token, a further eastward enlargement will also benefit the Latvian economy. That is why we support it. This direction is very clear. This enlargement can, however, take place under one essential condition: that the countries that want to be part of the European Union also accept our fundamental values. They are freedom, democracy and the rule of law. And the rule of law is decisive here.

Think for a moment – of us being a small country, of the history of our country. What is the history of our country? From one angle, one could say that one regional or larger empire has ruled here, fought against the other, and we were all the time between them – whether those were the Germans or it was the Swedish regional empire, or the Polish regional empire, or the Russian empire. And then, where there are empires, there is the rule of power – the one who has a larger army, who has less shame, invades, rapes, shoots, takes, loots and does whatever they want. But if there is a rule of law, that is what small peoples, small nations, need for us to exist at all. Because what stands between us and chaos? The law.

Hence, if the European Union wants to get larger and we want to, it is very important for us that those who want to join share with us an understanding that the rule of law is the foundation of foundations. I am convinced that Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia share those values with us. That’s the basic benchmark we need to insist on.

In NATO, we have excellent cooperation with all our partners. When NATO Allies and our partners called on us to show solidarity and come to their aid, we did so immediately. Our soldiers have participated in missions and lost their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan. Our soldiers are currently serving in Kosovo, in the NATO KFOR peacekeeping mission. We actively go when our allies call us. Now that we have called on our allies, they have responded. It is very important for us to understand, and that is the answer if someone asks the question – was it the right thing to do then? It was the right thing, because the argument at the time was that what if, heaven forbid, we were the ones who needed support. Right now, we do not, but we will help, say, in Afghanistan or Iraq. Today, all those whom we helped, all of them are present here in Latvia. The United Kingdom, having left the European Union, nevertheless remains a very important Ally for us both economically and militarily. It is leading the Joint Expeditionary Force, which includes our Nordic partners, and with the impending accession of Sweden to NATO, the JEF is about to become a NATO force as well, and here our cooperation with the UK is quite important.

At a political level, which also is in NATO, it is the NB8 format of cooperation between the Baltic and Nordic countries, or in the European Union, the NB6. Cooperation with our northern neighbours is very important, as is the case with the rest of the Baltic States and Poland. This is what takes place on a daily basis – with me, the Prime Minister, the President of Latvia, and the Speaker of the Saeima. This makes us strong. At the heart of our common foreign policy, there is assistance to Ukraine, active participation in the European Union, including in support of its enlargement, and active participation and engagement with all our NATO partners, of course bearing in mind our major strategic partners and thanking them for their contribution and all the good things they have done in Latvia. In particular, the United States, which has helped considerably in finance, including the development of the Lielvārde Air Base, should be highlighted here. In Lielvārde, the German Air Force will be based this spring, moving from the Ämari base in Estonia while modernization works are underway there. Likewise, the United States has been very active in helping to acquire various weapons systems. I think and hope that partners appreciate that we are investing in our security and we greatly appreciate the contribution of every one of our NATO Allies, not only on the eastern flank as a whole, but also specifically in Latvia.

In addition to this basic field, which we have been working on in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for 20 years, we are developing a new, complementary direction, and that direction and the idea behind it is that we have stabilised ourselves in Europe and NATO over 20 years, we are confident as a country, we have experience, we need to begin moving more actively outside the framework of those countries and seek friendship with third countries. Let us call them the Global South. Central and South America, African countries south of Egypt, and also in the East – in Asia. We have great opportunities there and a number of reasons why it matters to us.

The first one is that our country’s economic development is based on exports. We need to attract more and more investment so that we have more exporting companies. But an exporting company needs a market. We are very well represented throughout the European Union, also in America, Australia, Japan, but outside the OECD we still have much ground to cover. The more actively we seek political contacts, the more actively we must try to do so in tandem with our entrepreneurs to help open the doors for them.

The second reason is our own security. The Global South is also part of the United Nations, and various types of resolutions are being considered at the United Nations headquarters in New York, including on the war in Ukraine. This is not where Russia has been lazy. It works very actively in South America, for example, and in Africa; the Russian narrative is known to everyone, while the truth is not so widely known. We bear news and explain that the Russian war in Ukraine is the same old colonial war where a former colonizer is trying to reclaim his lost colony, Ukraine. And believe me, because I have spoken to representatives of these countries, countries that have themselves been colonised understand that immediately. If this is told by a country, say, our good European partners, who had a role in it, the message may not be received well. We play a very important role while supporting Ukraine and strengthening our security – to go and stretch out our hand of friendship to those countries, explain what is happening in our region.

This takes us to the third reason: Latvia’s candidacy in the 2025 election for a seat on the United Nations Security Council for the term of 2026-2027. We are working very actively to gain support for our candidacy. As a country, we are confident that we have something to offer through our vision, and by paying our share in the context of global security. It is clear that improvements are needed in the way the United Nations works.

There is a fundamental difficulty due to the fact that the United Nations was founded after World War Two – those who won the war came together, created the United Nations to ensure that there would be no more such large-scale wars in the world and this would be guaranteed by its founders, including Russia. Now Russia itself has become an aggressor state. Nobody thought that could happen when setting up the organisation, but it is a fact and it is a huge challenge. We want to be part of the Security Council where such solutions will be found.

The next topic is active work with our diaspora. We do not fully know the size of the diaspora. After Brexit, we learned that Britain alone hosted 140 thousand of our nationals living there permanently. Earlier, the Foreign Ministry’s figures showed 70 thousand. Then it turned out that there were twice as many. If in Britain alone there are 140 thousand who were accounted for because of Brexit, then if we add how many there are in Ireland, Germany, Scandinavia and elsewhere, the number we get is impressive. We speak about it in Latvia, our companies complain that there is no workforce. We have very low unemployment, especially in the cities, and it is practically non-existent in Riga. Our workforce comes up short and we all know how politically sensitive the debate about opening up the labour market can be; however, no one is arguing that a Latvian would be a problem when they return home. Accordingly, we have a potentially huge workforce abroad.

Our mission is to help our diaspora maintain its Latvian identity through Latvian schools and cultural events so that it does not disappear, so that we keep that connection. This year’s budget has some 2.9 million euros for that purpose, and the largest amount (nearly one million) of this goes to Latvian schools, Latvian language teaching methodology, books, teacher seminars and other activities, so that this Latvian environment could be maintained.

Next, we have development cooperation. Most often, in the international press, we see an English term for that, “development aid”. As we hear “development cooperation” in Latvian, maybe it is not quite clear to us what that means, because of our limited experience. We allocate 1.8 million euros to that end. If combined with funding envisaged for Ukraine, the Chernihiv region (5 million), that makes 6.8 million euros. Those are funds used by countries to provide aid to third countries while keeping in mind their own economies and businesses: the money in support of the Chernihiv region, too, goes mainly through our companies that build housing there or supply Latvian-made power generators, electrical equipment. Germany is using development cooperation as one of its major economic drivers. Our neighbours to the North are also dedicating more than €20 million to this end this year, which is money for their tech companies as well. I believe that we should contribute more to development cooperation because it is not just giving money away, it is part of economic development. And this is also, I think, a very important direction which to move forward in.

Let us turn to investments. On this, we as a country have been somewhat vacillating to and fro over the years… who are we expecting investment from after all? Maybe like in the 1990s – from anyone who has money, let them come! The world has evolved, we have evolved, and we have clearly defined in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs – our target audience for investments is OECD Member States. In translation – Western democracies, which also implies Japan, South Korea, Australia, the democratic world.

Why are investments from those countries important to us? Firstly, those countries and their legislation are similar to ours. Therefore, companies will understand things, the legal base will be related and intelligible. Secondly, the more investments our allies make in our country, the bigger the lobby in their countries, which reminds that Latvia is important. So that is our goal that we have to work on – exports not only to the OECD, but to the whole world. Let others pay our exporters for what they deliver! It is a very good thing. But above all, we must seek investments from among like-minded countries, and this also strengthens our own security.