Staunton, May 19 – Russian diplomats in Kyiv don’t speak Ukrainian and have not studied Ukrainian history or culture, a reflection of a general conviction among officials that they have no need to do so, according to Viktor Mironenko, the head of the Center for Ukrainian Research at the Moscow Institute of Europe. And those […]
Tag: Russian
Crimean Schools Shifting from Ukrainian to Russian as Language of Instruction
Staunton, May 5 – Ostensibly at the insistence of parental demands and despite Russian President Vladimir Putin’s declaration that there are three official languages on the peninsula, Russian is replacing Ukrainian as the language of instruction in schools there, according to a report in Izvestiya today. The Moscow paper says that parents in Sevastopol, Simferopol, […]
Moscow Needs a New Anti-Cosmopolitan Campaign, Russian Historian Says
Staunton, April 27 – One of the darkest pages in Soviet and indeed Russian history was the anti-cosmopolitan campaign Stalin unleashed against everything Western in 1949, a campaign that ultimately focused on the Jews whom the Soviet dictator was planning to deport beyond the Urals at the time of his death. Even those who remain […]
Feeling Like a Great Power is One Thing; Remaining One is Quite Another, Russian Commentators Say
Staunton, March 28 – Russian society is experiencing euphoria over what Vladimir Putin proclaims and many of them feel that with the seizure of Crimea, Russia has regained “the status of a great power.” But Moscow commentators warn it is far easier to claim or even believe Russia is again a great power than it […]