Latest news with #ethnicRussians
Russia Today
08-07-2025
- Politics
- Russia Today
Ukrainian teachers told to pretend they can't speak Russian
Ukraine's education ombudsman has advised schoolteachers to act as if they only understand Ukrainian when speaking with students. Kiev mandates the use of Ukrainian in most aspects of public life, despite a significant portion of the population speaking Russian as their native tongue. In an interview on Monday, Nadezhda Lishchik said her office had received complaints from school administrators about students who refused to speak Ukrainian during breaks. While teachers are required to speak Ukrainian at all times, students are allowed to use any language outside of the classroom. 'My advice was: 'You are not obliged to know a foreign language, unless you teach one, like English or German. You have full right to say you don't understand and insist on being addressed in the same language you use during classes.' You can influence students in a gentle way,' Lishchik said. The Ukrainization of public life has been a major policy focus for the government since the Western-backed armed coup in Kiev in 2014. Ukrainian law mandates the use of the state language in media, commerce and education. There are limited exemptions for some ethnic minorities, including Hungarians and Crimean Tatars, but not for the largest minority group, ethnic Russians. Despite the measures, research indicates that Russian remains widely used. A 2024 online content analysis reported by the Ukrainskaya Pravda newspaper found that while nearly 80% of Ukrainian posts on Facebook last year were in the state language, only 47% of TikTok clips were – a drop from 55% in 2023. Facebook's user base in Ukraine tends to be older, while TikTok is more popular with younger people. Kiev's difficulty encouraging children to use Ukrainian was also acknowledged last year by then-language ombudsman Taras Kremen, who lamented that just 39% of schoolchildren spoke Ukrainian at home, with even fewer using it among friends. Russian officials have accused Kiev of discriminating against ethnic Russians as part of what they call radical nationalist policies. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has described the Ukrainization campaign as a 'legislative extermination' of Russian culture.
Russia Today
16-06-2025
- Politics
- Russia Today
EU state MP says parents raided after Russian-language scandal
A Latvian MP has claimed his parents' home was raided in what he called an effort to intimidate him for defending the right of ethnic Russians in the country to speak their language. Alexey Roslikov, who is being investigated for inciting hatred over a recent speech in parliament, was reportedly briefly detained and released on Monday. In his address to the Saeima earlier this month, Roslikov accused the government of persecuting Latvia's Russian minority, who make up roughly 25% of the population. He concluded his remarks in Russian and was escorted out for violating parliamentary rules established in May that mandate using only the Latvian language. The authorities launched a probe against the lawmaker, accusing him of aiding an 'aggressor state' [Russia] against Latvia. The country's State Security Service (VDD) confirmed conducting searches at properties linked to the MP, local media reported Monday. Several members of Roslikov's For Stability! party reported his detention. The lawmaker later posted a video on social media stating he had been barred from leaving the country while the VDD probe continues. He has accused the authorities of targeting his family in an effort to apply psychological pressure. 'They searched my place, they even searched my parents' place, they searched everything they could,' he said. Roslikov maintained that no evidence links him to Russia and described the allegations as a pretext for a more invasive investigation. He dismissed claims that advocating for the rights of ethnic Russians amounts to a criminal act. The June 5 speech marked Roslikov's final address in the national legislature before he relinquished his mandate five days later. On June 7, he was elected to Riga's municipal legislature, and under Latvian law, he cannot serve in both roles. His resignation stripped him of the prosecutorial immunity afforded to MPs. Since the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in February 2022, Latvia and its Baltic neighbors, Estonia and Lithuania, have ramped up enforcement actions against individuals and organizations suspected of Russian ties. Among the measures taken by Riga are mandatory Latvian language exams for ethnic Russians. Hundreds of people have reportedly been deported for failing the exam or refusing to take it. Moscow has repeatedly accused the Baltic states of pursuing discriminatory policies against ethnic Russians driven by nationalist motives.
