In Riga, two sites refused to hold a lecture by Russian urbanist and author of the “City for People” project Arkady Gershman, which was supposed to be held on April 28. Gershman himself spoke about this on Facebook.
According to him, on the day of the lecture, around 12 noon, one of the places wrote that he would not be able to let him in, because “the authorities prevented city residents from being allowed in.” He pointed out that another “fell in a similar way,” but he was warned about it in advance and asked to “enter the situation.”
Gershman writes that no one communicated with him or the lecture organizers officially or handed them any papers, although “there were communications.” Al-Muhadhar added: “But the signal was more than clear.”
He explained that he was aware of all the risks after canceling a lecture by Korean researcher Andrei Lankov in February of this year, but he himself obtained “a kind of electronic visa that he obtained from the Latvian authorities,” and the topics of his lectures did not pose any threat to state security.
“In addition, I was traveling at the invitation of an Estonian company with ready-made dubbing subtitles in Latvian. In general, we were confident that we had done more than necessary to ensure that Gershman’s lecture was not read as a secret circle to overthrow regimes,” the urban affairs specialist wrote.
Ultimately, the lecture was held online – according to Gershman, this was “the only safe option.” He pointed out that before that, the same lectures were held in Estonia, the Czech Republic, Germany, Finland and other countries, and no problems occurred.
On February 24, a lecture was scheduled in Riga by Andrei Lankov, Doctor of Historical Sciences, Orientalist and Professor at Kookmin University in Seoul, where he was going to speak about North Korea. However, this event was attended by employees of the municipal police and border guards. Lankov was quickly transferred to the immigration service, and later the Latvian Ministry of Foreign Affairs declared him persona non grata in the country – based on information available to the national security authorities. Lankov was banned from entering the country indefinitely and was transferred from Latvia to Estonia.