Latvian Ambassador makes fake claim as to ‘fake news’ in response to Scott Taylor’s 7 May Column (Halifax Chronicle Herald) “Celebrating Nazis is bad: Period."

Scott Taylor replies: The simple response to the allegation I am perpetuating ‘Fake News’ is to remind readers that this moniker does not apply if the facts are true. Every year on 16 March, hundreds of Latvians march through the centre of Riga to commemorate the Waffen SS Latvian Legion. This is not a private ceremony as the Ambassador suggests, but rather a very public expression of support to a military unit that was part of Hitler’s notorious SS killing machine. The Holocaust did not simply ‘happen’ to Latvian jews, it was perpetrated by willing Latvian volunteers such as the ruthless thug Herberts Cukurs and his henchmen in the Arajs Kommandos who prided themselves of making Latvia “Juden Frei” by 1943. That same year Heinrich Himmler formed the Latvian SS Legion and at its core was Cukurs and the Arajs Kommando. To suggest that somehow the Latvian Legion, comprised of these murderers was not directly implicated in the Holocaust is an insult to our collective intelligence. For the Ambassador to claim that the 16 March parade is an expression of Free Speech means there is still a misunderstanding in recently democratized, former Soviet Republic Latvia as to the clear line between Free Speech and Hate Speech. The core of Nazi ideology is rooted in anti-semitic hate. Celebrating it is simply wrong and these parades need to be stopped. For the record, from 1998 until 200 the 16 March parades were in fact official, and again even this year the right wing, Nationalist opposition party tabled a motion to re-instate official status to these ceremonies. If Canada is going to commit troops and money to protect democratic values in Latvia from Russian aggression, we have the right to remind Latvia that celebrating the Holocaust perpetrators is totally counter to our own Canadian set of values.