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Friday May 25, 6:31 PMEmperor, empress arrive in Latvia, set to visit Freedom Monument(Kyodo) _ Japanese Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko arrived Friday in Latvia from Estonia on the third leg of their 10-day five-nation tour in Europe, marking their first visit to the Baltic state.They will meet with Latvian President Vaira Vike-Freiberga -- the first woman president in the former communist bloc -- at Riga Castle and later visit the Monument of Freedom, Latvia's national symbol of freedom and independence, in central Riga to lay flowers there. The monument, built in 1935 commemorating the establishment of its independence in 1918, has since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 been the stage of various events for Latvians who suffered under Soviet rule. The imperial couple is then to attend a luncheon hosted by the president and her husband, Imants Freibergs, at the Blackheads House before visiting the Museum of the Occupation of Latvia, which displays artifacts from the occupation by Nazi Germany during World War II and the subsequent occupation by the Soviet Union. Like the two other Baltic states -- Estonia and Lithuania --Latvia was annexed into the Soviet Union in 1940 and regained its independence in 1991 when the union was dissolved. The Japanese couple first went to Sweden and then Estonia, their first-ever visit to a Baltic state, during the latest trip, which began Monday. They are scheduled to go to Lithuania on Saturday and Britain on Sunday. In Lithuania, they will visit a monument to pay their respects to Chiune Sugihara, a Japanese consul in the country credited for saving thousands of Jews from the Nazi Holocaust during World War II by issuing them transit visas in defiance of his government's orders. They will return home on Wednesday. |
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