The BT1 Hall, located in Riga's citypart Kipsala, is not happy with LTV's decision on the venue for the Eurovision Song Contest.

On August 1, the EBU will oficially announce that the Skonto Hall will be the venue for the Eurovision Song Contest 2003.

Ieva Skrastina, the head of the BT1 public relations department, said: “BT1 wants to have an objective explanation why the Skonto Hall was preferred to BT1 in Kipsala. There were no uniform criteria already in the very beginning how both bidders for hosting the Eurovision Song Contest should be evaluated, Skrastina said. “BT1 has learned there were supplemental criteria which had not been reported to representatives of the Kipsala Exhibition Center“.

LTV said that the BT1 bid was turned down “due to the object's incompatibility with the requirements of the European Broadcasting Union for organization of the Eurovision Song Contest, and the Latvian State Television's requirements for developing broadcast“. BT1 director Viesturs Tile believes that the bid of BT1 meets all requirements of LTV and all technical regulations and wants LTV to evaluate both venues again.