Now some similar questions are being asked about the flying habits of his successor as Prime Minister, Evika Siliņa, reports Latvian Television's topical discussion show What's Happening in Latvia? (Kas notiek Latvijā?/KNL?)
During his four-year premiership, Kariņš went on 36 foreign visits using private planes, costing more than 1.3 million euros, of which more than 600 thousand came from the state purse, and more than 700 thousand euros were covered by the European Union. In several cases, the expensive flights were used so that Kariņš could return to Latvia on Friday evening instead of during the weekend.
Now Siliņa finds herself in a similar situation with KNL? reporting that more than 323 thousand euros were uneconomically spent on trips to the European Council, including more than 19 thousand on the flight of Evika Siliņa and her accompanying delegation on a Friday evening charter flight instead of a cheaper commercial flight on a Saturday.
Last year on the afternoon of Wednesday, October 25, Siliņa went to the European Council in Brussels together with a delegation of six other people – the head of the prime minister's office, an adviser on European Union (EU) affairs, a press secretary, a photographer, the deputy state secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for European affairs and a representative of the State Security Service – aboard an airBaltic regular commercial flight.
The return journey took place on the evening of Friday, October 27, with a charter flight provided by the German airline "Platoon Aviaton GmbH & Co", for which EUR 26,756 was paid.
In e-mail correspondence on October 18 with the subject "air tickets Riga-Brussels-Riga October 25-27", the representative of the prime minister's office initially announced to the travel agency employee the intention to return to Riga on the afternoon of October 27 with a regular flight via Berlin. In further correspondence regarding the unavailability of seats, including in business class, several more options were discussed with transfers via Vienna, Copenhagen or Munich.
When choosing the option via Munich, the employee of the prime minister's office asked about booking corporate tickets "because it may be necessary to change the return date to October 28, the morning direct flight". The answer follows that there will not be enough seats for everyone on this flight, but in the next e-mail from the employee of the Prime Minister's office, the next morning's direct flight is no longer mentioned and for the first time an assumption appears - "it is possible that we will have to look at a charter for the return trip on October 27".
After a short while, the representative of the travel agency said in an e-mail that there will be enough seats for the entire delegation on the morning flight of airBaltic on October 28 at 9.40 to Riga "but you have to make a reservation so as not to lose your seats". However, there was no response from the prime minister's office.
The correspondence can be read in the PDF attachment to this story.
The following morning, on October 19, the correspondence resumes with an e-mail from the Prime Minister's office with a different title – "charter on October 27", asking the travel agency to provide a charter plane from Brussels to Rīga with "flexible departure flights", mentioning that the meeting ends at 15.00 and departure "could be at 15.30". This was followed by the offer of four different aircraft, in the correspondence obtained by KNL?
According to KNL?'s available information, the European Council meeting ran only slightly longer than expected and the Latvian delegation left the meeting place before half past four in the afternoon. Departure from Brussels took place at 17.30 local time, arrival in Riga at 20.42.
The return took place using a Pilatus PC-24 executive aircraft. Correspondence between representatives of the prime minister's office and the travel agency reveals that four charter aircraft options were offered, of which the cheapest – a Citation Excel – was 4,536 euros less than the one chosen. In addition to the offer price, another 1,500 euros were paid for flexibility – the possibility to fly out any time in the period from 13.00 to 19.00.
The agency's offer shows that the offered charter flight options also have several differences in terms of cold and hot meals, the availability of flight attendants and the arrangement of seats. Siliņa said she was not involved in discussions about which plane type to choose, answering: "If I had to choose planes, I would definitely go crazy".
An investigation into the use of special charter flights, which dates back to the Kariņš period, is being continued by the Corruption Prevention and Combating Bureau (KNAB) under the supervision of the prosecutor's office. Siliņa told KNL? that the flight she used back in October was not among the cases under investigation. She also said that the charter flight was made possible by the funding of the European Union and that such practices were commonplace among EU heads of government.
Nevertheless, there is now certain to be greater scrutiny of leading politicians' travel plans and debate about what constitutes good value for money for Latvian and other EU taxpayers.
