Latvia holds snap poll

Latvia holds snap polls Saturday as it struggles to emerge from Europe's deepest recession and three months after parliament was dissolved over corruption. The pro-Russia Harmony Centre party could win the most votes, polls say, but analysts predict that rival parties, weary of its links to Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, will block it from leading a coalition. The election was forced by a July referendum, where more than 90 percent of voters backed a move by ex-president Valdis Zatlers to dissolve parliament. He used a never-deployed presidential power to call the referendum, after parliament refused to lift the immunity of wealthy opposition lawmaker Ainars Slesers, hampering an anti-corruption probe. An October 2010 election was supposed to bring Latvia a new era of stability, but Zatlers' successful campaign against the "oligarchs" who straddle the business and political worlds brought down the government, prompting the second election in nine months. Latvia's formerly booming economy went bust in 2008 when the Baltic state of 2.2 million was hit by a recession that saw the economy shrink by 25 percent over 2008 and 2009 combined. Riga was forced to return to lenders including the EU and International Monetary Fund for a 7.5-billion-euro ($10.9-billion) rescue package, but has since restored confidence, partly by implementing biting austerity measures. Incumbent Prime Minister Valdis Dombrovskis, 40, has steered Latvia out of the deep recession and back into growth and analysts believe he could emerge from Saturday's vote with a new term. But a poll conducted by Latvijas Fakti indicates no party will win an outright majority and protacted coalition talks are expected to follow the election. The pro-Russia Harmony Centre could take 21 percent of the vote, while Dombrovskis' centre-right Unity movement has 15 percent support, according to the poll. The new Zatlers Reform party, created by the ex-president to champion his anti-corruption message, also polled at 15 percent. "I won't be voting for any of the oligarch parties, and I think a lot of other people will be thinking the same way," Riga-based family doctor Sandra Agrina, 52, told AFP on Friday. Two other parties -- the Union of Greens and Farmers, and the Nationalist Alliance -- are both expected to pass the five percent threshold needed to enter the 100-seat parliament, or Saeima. Harmony Centre draws most of its support from Latvia's sizable Russian minority, accounting for some 27 percent of the population, but worries some ethnic Latvians because it has a formal cooperation deal with Putin's United Russia party. The ethnic Latvian parties which have in the past managed to capture enough votes to form coalition governments have long shunned the Harmony Centre due to its ties with Latvia's Soviet-era master Moscow. Dombrovskis, in power since March 2009, when a previous government collapsed, heads a two-party coalition made up mostly of ethnic Latvians.