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Latvia’s centre-right Prime Minister Evika Siliņa announced on Thursday she will resign from the top job following coalition controversy and a drone incident, effectively triggering the collapse of the country’s governing alliance.
“Today, I have made the difficult but honest decision – to step down from the position of Prime Minister,” Siliņa stated in a post on social media platform X. The comments mirrored a televised address.
She said her priorities have always been Latvia’s security and people, but “political envy and narrow party interests” have taken precedence over responsibility.
Siliņa’s resignation means the de facto collapse of the governing tripartite coalition, which has been under strain for months.
The most recent controversy surrounds the resignation of the Baltic nation’s left-leaning defence minister Andris Sprūds. He left the position following calls from Siliņa to do so, and after Latvia’s air defences were breached by Ukrainian drones diverted from Russia.
Sprūds’ Progressives Party pulled support from the government as a result, leaving Siliņa of the Unity Party without a majority.
Latvia was scheduled to face parliamentary elections in October.
The country’s President Edgars Rinkevics, tasked with appointing a new head of government, is set to meet with representatives of all parliamentary parties on Friday.
On Sunday, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said the incidents in Latvia were “the result of Russian electronic warfare deliberately diverting Ukrainian drones from their targets in Russia.”
He offered Ukraine’s help to the Baltic states and Finland to detect and prevent them. Ukraine has developed a highly sophisticated air defence systems after years of war, largely fought through long-range missiles and drones.
A week of political hell
In a separate incident, Latvia’s Minister for Agriculture Armands Krauze and the Director of the State Chancellery Raivis Kronbergs have been detained by the country’s Corruption Prevention and Combating Bureau (KNAB), prosecutors confirmed to Latvian news agency LETA.
Raids were carried out on the pair’s residences and workplaces, with their phones reportedly switched off.
In what is being billed by some Latvian press as the most high-profile anti-corruption probe in the country’s history, the pair have been detained while prosecutors conduct their investigation.
The charges concern misuse of authority and alleged carelessness in the illegal allocation of government aid to companies in the timber sector.
Timber processing is Latvia’s largest industrial sector, with forests covering 3.441 million hectares of land or 53% of the country’s territory. The industry is worth €3.3 billion, Latvia’s Investment and Development Agency says.