The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine commented on the statement of the mayor of Daugavpils - the second largest city in Latvia - about "Russian Crimea" and the avoidance of the Latvian politician from calling Russia the aggressor and the sole culprit of the war.
The statement was made public by the representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Oleg Nikolenko on Monday.
"The mayor of the Latvian city of Daugavpils Andrejs Elksninsh justifies the crimes of Russia in Ukraine. It is not surprising that his political power ended up on the sidelines of politics after the results of the last elections to the Latvian Diet," Nikolenko noted on his Facebook page.
He added that, fortunately, "the statements of this marginal figure do not reflect either the official position of Latvia, which is friendly to us, or the views of the absolute majority of Latvians, who not only sincerely sympathize, but also actively help Ukraine in the fight against Russian aggression."
As reported, Andreis Elksninsh answered the question about Crimea that "Crimea is part of the Russian Federation." After noting that almost the entire international community did not recognize the occupation of the peninsula, he replied that it was, but "it is impossible to separate the facts that it was included in the Russian Federation, and that the whole world continued to cooperate with Russia after that."
Answering a question about Russia's responsibility for the killing of civilians in Buch, the mayor said that "Russia, Ukraine, and the United States are responsible for everything that happened." Elksninsh also believes that the "failure of diplomacy" is to blame for the war.
Andreys Elksninsh is a representative of the Social Democratic Party "Saskaņa" ("Concord"), which has traditionally had significant support among Russian-speaking residents of Latvia and only failed to overcome the 5% barrier in the last elections to the Diet in the fall of 2022.