#balticstates

Estonia same-sex law breaks taboo in former Soviet states
▻http://euobserver.com/lgbti/125988
Estonia on Thursday (9 October) became the first former Soviet republic to grant equal rights to same-sex couples.

MPs in the Riigikogu passed the bill by a narrow majority of 40 against 38 with 10 abstentions.

The Cohabitation Act was backed by the Reform Party of 35-year old prime minister Tavi Roivas, the EU’s youngest leader.

It means that from 2016 gay couples will have the same rights as straight couples in terms of inheritance, access to partners in hospitals, or joint adoption of children.❞

#Estonia #BalticStates #Same-sex_law #GayRights #Riigikogu

Russia’s information war in Lithuania
▻http://euobserver.com/political/125893

It is hard to find anyone in Lithuania who does not believe that Russia’s propaganda campaigns in the Baltic EU member state have been growing in intensity.

There has been an increasing number of pro-Soviet commentary in the media, while Moscow has threatened to re-open criminal cases against Lithuanians who refused to serve in the Soviet army and the Lithuanian State security department recently warned citizens to beware of being spied on.

In the febrile atmosphere, some analysts even see actor Jean Claude Van Damme’s forthcoming visit to the country as part of Russian propaganda.

#Lithuania #BalticStates #Russia #InformationWar #Propaganda #EthnicRussians #Ukraine #SovietUnion #Espionage

EUobserver / Euro not to blame for debt crisis, says commission nominee
▻http://euobserver.com/news/125912

The euro is not to blame for the sovereign debt crisis which forced several EU countries into multi-billion euro bailouts, the next commissioner for the single currency told MEPs Monday (6 September).

Speaking during his three-hour hearing with members of the Parliament’s economic affairs committee, Latvia’s commission nominee Valdis Dombrovskis commented that “we went through a crisis in Latvia without having the euro…the euro is the not the main issue to be blamed”.

Meanwhile, Dombrovskis deflected claims that, as a vice-president in the EU executive, he would effectively be the line manager of French commission candidate Pierre Moscovici.

#Valdis_Dombrovskis #Euro #EconomicCrisis #Latvia #BalticStates #EUCommissioners