| Summary: | Latvia is a parliamentary republic first established on 18 November 1918, whose constitution (Satversme) was adopted on 15 February 1922. Its de facto sovereignty and independence ended with the USSR's occupation as from 1940 and were restored by the Declaration of the Renewal of the Independence of the Republic of Latvia dated 4 May 1990 and the 21 August 1991 declaration re-establishing de facto independence, both of which proclaimed the authority of the Satversme. The Satversme was fully reinstated on 6 July 1993 when the parliament (Saeima) convened after the first democratic elections since the 1930s. On 17 June 1999, the 100-member Saeima cast 53 votes for Vaira Vike-Freiberga, who became the first woman to be elected president in the former Soviet Union
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