Eduards Berklavs
Eduards Berklavs was a Latvian politician.
Eduards Berklavs was born in Kurmāle Parish, today part of the Kuldīga Municipality. During his youth, he was active in labour and communist organizations. In 1930s, he was arrested and served a prison sentence for his communist activities. After Latvia was occupied by the Soviet Union in 1940, he being a Komsomol and Communist Party official, rising to the deputy chairman of the Council of Ministers of Latvian SSR in 1950s. In this position, he opposed the Soviet policies of Russification, supported a larger role for Latvian language and proposed to limit immigration from other parts of Soviet Union to Latvia. This led to him being labelled as Latvian nationalist and deposed from his position in 1959.
In late 1980s, Berklavs became a Latvian independence activist. He was one of founders and the first chairman of Latvian National Independence Movement, a pro-independence political organization. He was simultaneously active in Latvian Popular Front and the Congress of Citizens of Latvia. During this period, Berklavs was one of the most prominent independence activists. He was elected to the Latvian parliament in 1990 and 1993 and, both times, was the oldest member of the parliament.
