Why ukrainians speak russian

The Eurasia Center regularly convenes with regional leaders and key global figures to galvanize international support for a free, prosperous, and peaceful future in Eurasia. Explore our events, debates, and flagship discussions below. The past six years of Russian hybrid warfare have made Kremlin attitudes towards the language issue crystal clear, and have only served to underline the importance of safeguarding the status of Ukrainian.

Zelenskyy wishes to enter Ukrainian history as a unifying figure who transcends linguistic boundaries, but he must trend carefully. If a new language war breaks out in Ukraine, the only winner will be Vladimir Putin.

UkraineAlert Mar 30, By Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze. The coronavirus crisis is creating unprecedented challenges for the international community, but existing security threats like the Russian attack on Ukraine must not disappear from the diplomatic agenda, argues Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze.

BelarusAlert Jun 15, By Viktoriya Zakrevskaya. A combination of domestic and geopolitical factors makes the upcoming Belarusian presidential election the most important for a generation, but can Lukashenko be defeated democratically? UkraineAlert Jun 9, By Andreas Umland. The annexation of Crimea is proving expensive for the Kremlin. Ukrainian, the official language, belongs with Russian and Belarusian to the East Slavic branch of the Slavic language family.

Ukrainian is closely related to Russian but also has distinct similarities to the Polish language. According to the constitution, the state has an obligation to ensure the comprehensive development and functioning of the Ukrainian language in all spheres of social life, while guaranteeing the free development, use and protection of the Russian language and other languages of national minorities. Tools Why we need to collect data on the languages of crisis-affected people PDF.

Language data allows humanitarian organizations to better understand the languages people speak and understand, leading to better programming and accountability. For more information, read about the project on our blog or contact [email protected].

Static map highlighting the most common languages spoken in Ukraine. But the state pressure in favor of Ukrainian and against Russian has continued under Mr. Zelenskyy said. Government officials have largely kept in line with the president. There was only one top official — Interior Minister Arsen Avakov — who stuck to Russian in public speeches, but he resigned on July 15 after months of tensions with Mr.

Some public officials and lawmakers tried to soften the language law. Fifty-one lawmakers from both a pair of pro-Russian parties and Mr.

And as of July 16, every television show and movie in a foreign language broadcast on Ukrainian television is required to be dubbed, or at least subtitled, in Ukrainian — even decades-old Soviet classics that many Ukrainians know by heart.

The culture minister, Alexander Tkachenko, said he tried to postpone the measure, arguing that it could be pricey for television channels and news outlets, especially when it comes to lengthy television series. Tkachenko told a news conference on July 8. Officials have already reported and fined several television networks for showing content in Russian.

Other analysts see the law as a ploy to marginalize the kind of multiculturalism promoted in the European Union — and to ghettoize Russian-speaking Ukrainians. Some Ukrainians do feel marginalized. But linguistic bias over Russian and Ukrainian can cut both ways.

In the breakaway regions in the east, pro-Russian separatists banned Ukrainian, and anyone speaking it there could end up in one of dozens of makeshift concentration camps where thousands of people are held without trial and face torture and even execution, says professor Ihor Kozlovsky.

The religious scholar spent almost days in several such camps between and after organizing a series of pro-Ukrainian rallies in the city of Donetsk.

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