During an Oct. 9 conference dedicated to the five-year anniversary of KNAB, the Latvian anti-corruption bureau, Prime Minister Aigars Kalvitis said the bureau should be more transparent in its activities. He discouraged the institution from installing secret cameras, arguing that covert operations are not the best way to uncover corruption 's noting that public participation is much more effective. He also encouraged KNAB to focus more on international crime. Tensions between Kalvitis and KNAB flared recently, when the prime minister suspended the bureau's head over relatively minor faults found in an audit. NGOs accused Kalvitis of using the suspension to hamper an investigation into his political party's funds.
The highly publicized Rally Latvija 2007 ended in diasaster when a car lost control and skidded off the track on Oct. 6, injuring three people. Raimonds Stokss and Anrijs Jesse's rally car was in the last circuits of the rally when it unexpectedly spun out of control and flew into an area crowded with fans. A total of 81 crews applied for the race, which took place in three locations around Latvia.
The national women's basketball team finished fourth in the Eurobasket Women's championship after an Oct. 7 loss to Belarus. The final score of the bronze medal game was 72-63. The result was the best that Latvian basketball has ever achieved on the European level. The team will now be allowed to participate in the Beijing Olympic Games' qualification matches next year. After a relatively successful first quarter, the Latvian team fell far behind in the second and third quarters, and faced an 18 point deficit going into the fourth quarter. A late-game rally was not enough for the Latvian team to pull ahead. The leading scorer on the Latvian side was Liene Jansone with 23 points.
Hackers broke into the Interior Ministry's Web site on the morning of Oct. 5. The hackers left a message reading "what happens in our country?" along with a number of other banners. Javascript code containing the message was inserted into the discussion section of the Web site, but no other content on the page was changed, nor was the system itself accessed. The ministry plans to question Tiklsnet, the company hired to maintain the page, over how the hackers could have posted the banners. This was the second time this year hackers have left mysterious messages on interior ministry Web sites.
