On Tuesday, 4 September, Solvita Āboltiņa, Speaker of the Saeima, met with Mark Pekala, the new Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States to Latvia. In welcoming her guest to the Saeima, Āboltiņa emphasised that this year marks the 90th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Latvia and the USA and that parliamentary cooperation has played a crucial role over the decades. Latvia considers the USA to be a strategic partner; therefore, it is important to ensure close cooperation at the political level, as well as in the business environment and the security and defence sectors. 

On 4 September the Saeima will commence its autumn session of 2012, which entails convening regular plenary sittings, elaborating draft laws and scrutinising the work of the government. 

On Tuesday, 28 August, the Legal Affairs Committee of the Saeima supported amendments to the Citizenship Law to be considered in the second reading; these amendments will enable Latvian expatriates to acquire dual citizenship, Latvians in exile and their descendants to retain their citizenship, and ethnic Latvians and Livs permanently residing outside Latvia to be granted citizenship. The amendments will also set forth how citizenship is granted to children born in Latvia of non-citizens and to children born abroad into families of Latvian citizens.

At decisive moments, the people of Latvia have been able to unite in the name of common goals and to put their state and its future above everything else.

This week, the number of followers of the Saeima’s profile on Twitter - @Jekaba11 - reached 5,000. Since the new website of the Saeima was launched in 2010, the number of people visiting the website of the Saeima or its profiles on social networks has increased significantly.

On Tuesday, 31 July, at the main building of the Saeima, the Speaker of the Saeima met with the heads of Latvia’s diplomatic missions and noted that Latvia’s presidency of the Council of the European Union in 2015 will be one of the most significant challenges for the state in the near future.

On Thursday, 26 July, the Saeima in the third and final reading adopted the Law on Tax Support Measure with a view to relieve the tax debt burden incurred by taxpayers as a result of the economic crisis. The Law defines a range of taxpayers eligible to apply for the support measure, namely, companies that have incurred tax debts before 1 September 2011.

On Thursday, 26 July, in the second review the Saeima adopted amendments to the Law on National Referendums and Initiation of Legislation which were drafted by the Legal Affairs Committee.

Since the 11th Saeima convened, the Presidium has received submissions from 63 MPs renouncing the use of hard copies of documents related to plenary sittings. A symbolic green spruce is glued on their file boxes.

It is noteworthy that currently 10,000 citizens, including youths who have reached the age of 16, can introduce in the agenda of the Saeima any matter that has to be reviewed according to legislative procedure; therefore, referendums on draft laws should no longer be regarded as referendums for probing public opinion, emphasised Deputy Speaker Inese Lībiņa-Egnere on 20 July at the conference The Arithmetic of People’s Will: Elections and Referendums in Latvia.