Latvia's 'cakegate' minister quits

0 Comments | AFP, April, 2008

RIGA (AFP) — A Latvian government minister has quit after failing to weather a storm over the use of state funds to pay for her birthday party, a spokeswoman announced Monday.

Ina Gudele, the Baltic state's minister for e-government, handed over the letter of resignation to Prime Minister Ivars Godmanis, said Gudele's spokeswoman Inese Aunina.

"It was a logical step for her," Aunina told AFP.

"Nothing else was possible for her but to step down," she added.

Gudele has been in the spotlight since last week, when Latvian media first reported that her 43rd birthday party on June 12, 2007 had been paid for from public coffers.

According to Aunina, 790 lats (1,144 euros, 1,801 dollars) were spent on the party, a sum Gudele "paid back as soon as the...