Brussels, 09/11/2011 (Agence Europe) - On Wednesday 9 November, the European Commission approved an aid regime worth around 71.5 million Latvian lats (LVL) (€101.71 million) to support the roll-out of high-speed broadband networks in Latvia. Consumers and businesses will benefit from connection speeds of between 30 and 100 Mb per second to use improved internet services. The regime also aims to further reduce the digital divide between rural and urban areas. According to the vice-president of the Commission with responsibility for competition issues, “Latvia's broadband support scheme meets the Commission's Digital Agenda objectives of bringing very high-speed broadband to all European citizens. The scheme contains sufficient safeguards to limit competition distortions and supports only networks which are open to all users on a non-discriminatory basis.” Joaquin Almunia went on to state that “this will stimulate competition between network infrastructures and services”. (OL/transl.fl)