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Latvian minister calls for freeze on Rail Baltica project

Latvia cannot afford the Rail Baltica project at this time, so work on it should be suspended for one year until such time as all financial issues have been resolved.  This was stated in an interview with the LETA News Agency by Agriculture Minister Armands Krauze.

Krauze notes that mistakes were made when planning for the Rail Baltica project.  Project costs were initially estimated at EUR 1.9 billion, but they have now ballooned to around EUR 10 billion.

“Of course there has been inflation,” the minister says.  “It is clear, however, that there has been an absence of good planning and progress in this project.  Personally I do not see how we could support an expenditure of almost ten billion euros for Rail Baltica.  Perhaps people dreamed about getting on a train in Rīga and disembarking in Berlin, but now we realise that we will board the train not in Rīga, but in Salaspils.  EUR 10 billion, for heaven’s sake!  Latvia doesn’t have that kind of money, but no one is pointing out that we honestly cannot afford this project.”

Minister Krauze argued that Latvia cannot spend national budget resources on the project, which means that it will be necessary to borrow money.  The European Commission initially promised to finance 85% of the project cost, but now it is clear that the actual funding will be much lower than that, and it may be that some 15% will come from Brussels, but Latvia will have to finance the remaining 85%.

“I cannot except a situation in which my children and grandchildren will have to pay for Rail Baltica, because we don’t even know right now whether there will be trains along that line,” says Krauze.  “Nobody is talking about this.”

The minister added that he was expressing his own personal opinion and that he had not discussed it with the Latvian Alliance of the Green Party and Farmers Union, which he represents.  Krauze believes that Europe should cover 85% of the project cost, that the Rail Baltica line should pass through Rīga, and that more information is needed about the source of financing for all of this.

“We don’t buy luxury items for ourselves, our house or our family if we don’t have the money,” Krauze argues.  “We are sitting in a wooden shed, dreaming of having a castle, and hoping that someone will give us billions to build the castle.”

The minister also noted that many myths have sprung up around the project, including one that relates to military mobility.  The truth is that military mobility is important, but Latvia already has a good road network for this purpose.  Mr Krauze added that only four bridges are being planned for Latvia as part of the Rail Baltica project, but given how bridges have been regularly destroyed in the military conflict in Ukraine, it is clear that they would be of no great meaning in military mobility.

Bridges cannot be protected, and a good road network is more important for military mobility, Krauze says.

As reported in the past, Latvia’s Saeima voted on June 13 to set up a parliamentary inquiry committee charged with examining mistakes that have been made during the implementation of the Rail Baltica railways project.  The panel was proposed by a group of 34 opposition and unaffiliated lawmakers.

Source: BNS

(Reproduction of BNS information in mass media and other websites without written consent of BNS is prohibited.)

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