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Russian North Korea Specialist Removed From Latvia After Persona Non Grata Declaration
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Andrei Lankov, a well-known Russian scholar of North Korea, reported on February 25 that he was detained during a lecture in Latvia, declared persona non grata, and expelled from the country.
Lankov himself speculated that his expulsion was due to his “excessively objective” views on North Korea, stating that he occasionally makes positive remarks about the country and does not adopt a hysterical tone when criticizing it.
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Lankov was scheduled to give a talk on North Korean politics in Riga when police arrived at the venue and detained him.
“They said I had been placed on the foreign ministry’s list of people who are banned from entering Latvia, and I must now be immediately deported,” Lankov shared on his Telegram channel.
The 62-year-old historian explained that the police did not provide a reason for his banishment from Latvia. The Russian Anti-War Committee, an exiled civil society group, revealed on February 24 that Lankov’s lawyer was informed of Latvia’s decision to declare him persona non grata the week earlier.
“Overall everything is fairly clear. The authorities do not like the fact that I refuse to turn real-life situations into politically convenient caricatures,” he stated in a post.
“I believe they see my writing style as excessively objective and they see it as a problem,” he said in an interview with NK News. “I say positive things about North Korea sometimes, and when negative, not in a hysterical style.”
According to T-Invariant Lankov's lecture was organized by the agency Curiosophy.events. This agency also arranged a lecture in Warsaw by archaeologist Alexander Butyagin, who was detained by Polish authorities in December at Ukraine's request. Butyagin faced accusations of conducting illegal excavations in Crimea, which has been annexed by Russia.
Earlier, Kazakhstan expelled 25-year-old Oleksandr Kachkurkin, a Crimean IT specialist who had been residing in Almaty for several years.
Upon his arrival in Russia, he was immediately detained by Russian security officers on the plane, under suspicion of state treason connected to money transfers to Ukraine.
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