Russian language in Ukraine
Encyclopedia
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
is a minority language
Minority language
A minority language is a language spoken by a minority of the population of a territory. Such people are termed linguistic minorities or language minorities.-International politics:...
in Ukraine
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
It is the most common first language
First language
A first language is the language a person has learned from birth or within the critical period, or that a person speaks the best and so is often the basis for sociolinguistic identity...
in Donbass and Crimea
Crimea
Crimea , or the Autonomous Republic of Crimea , is a sub-national unit, an autonomous republic, of Ukraine. It is located on the northern coast of the Black Sea, occupying a peninsula of the same name...
regions, the predominant language in large cities in the East and South of the country. The usage and status of the language (currently Ukrainian
Ukrainian language
Ukrainian is a language of the East Slavic subgroup of the Slavic languages. It is the official state language of Ukraine. Written Ukrainian uses a variant of the Cyrillic alphabet....
is the only official language of Ukraine) is an object of political disputes within Ukrainian society and the considerable Russian minority
Russians in Ukraine
Russians in Ukraine form the largest ethnic minority in the country, and the community forms the largest single Russian diaspora in the world. In the 2001 Ukrainian census, 8,334,100 identified themselves as ethnic Russians ....
of the country. The number of Russian-teaching schools has been systematically reduced since Ukrainian independence in 1991 and now it is much lower than the proportion of Russophone
Russophone
A Russophone is literally a speaker of the Russian language either natively or by preference. At the same time the term is used in a more specialized meaning to describe the category of people whose cultural background is associated with Russian language regardless of ethnic and territorial...
s, but still higher than the proportion of ethnic Russians.
R[List of schools in Ukraine|schools]] in the eastern and southern parts of the country and the more Ukrainian-oriented central
Right-bank Ukraine
Right-bank Ukraine , a historical name of a part of Ukraine on the right bank of the Dnieper River, corresponding with modern-day oblasts of Volyn, Rivne, Vinnitsa, Zhytomyr, Kirovohrad and Kiev, as well as part of Cherkasy and Ternopil...
and western
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
parts as outrageous violations of human rights
Human rights in Ukraine
Until very recently human rights in Ukraine were better than those in most former Soviet republics and Ukraine was labeled as "free" by organizations such as Freedom House. However in 2011 Freedom House labeled Ukraine "Partly Free"...
.
Former Ukrainian President Viktor Yuschenko has stated that Ukraine should give "full support to the development of the languages of national minorities" and the Law on Education grants Ukrainian families (parents and their children) a right to choose their native language for schools and studies. The Russian language is still studied as a required course in all secondary schools, including those with Ukrainian as the primary language of instructions.
History of Russian language in Ukraine
East Slavic languages originate in the language spoken in RusRus
Ruś may refer to the following places:*Ruś, Podlaskie Voivodeship, a village in Łomża County, north-eastern Poland*Ruś, Olsztyn County, a village in Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship, northern Poland...
. Significant differences in spoken language in different regions began to be noticed after the division of the Rus lands between Golden Horde and Lithuania. Lithuania, in time united with Poland. Muscovites under the Golden Horde developed the modern Russian language, people in the northern Lithuanian sector developed Belorussian, and in southern Polish sector Ukrainian.
It is worth noting that the ethnonyms "Ukraine" and "Ukrainian" were not used until the 19th century. The land was known in the West as Ruthenia
Ruthenia
Ruthenia is the Latin word used onwards from the 13th century, describing lands of the Ancient Rus in European manuscripts. Its geographic and culturo-ethnic name at that time was applied to the parts of Eastern Europe. Essentially, the word is a false Latin rendering of the ancient place name Rus...
, and the people as Ruthenians. The Russian imperial centre, however, preferred the names "Little" and "White" Russias, so as to describe the culture and linguistic differences with that of the "Great" Russians.
There was no geographical border between people speaking Russian and Ukrainian but rather gradual shift in vocabulary and pronunciation along the line between the historical cores of the languages. Since the 20th century, however, people have started to identify themselves with their spoken vernacular and conform to the literary norms set by academics.
Although the ancestors of a small ethnic group of Russians - Goriuns resided in Putyvl
Putyvl
Putyvl or Putivl is a town in north-east Ukraine, in Sumy Oblast. Currently about 20,000 people live in Putyvl.-History:One of the original Siverian towns, Putyvl was first mentioned as early as 1146 as an important fortress contested between Chernigov and Novgorod-Seversky principalities of...
region (what is modern northern Ukraine)
in the times of Grand Duchy of Lithuania
Grand Duchy of Lithuania
The Grand Duchy of Lithuania was a European state from the 12th /13th century until 1569 and then as a constituent part of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth until 1791 when Constitution of May 3, 1791 abolished it in favor of unitary state. It was founded by the Lithuanians, one of the polytheistic...
or perhaps even earlier, the Russian language in Ukraine has primarily come to exist in that country through two channels: the migration of ethnic Russians
Russians
The Russian people are an East Slavic ethnic group native to Russia, speaking the Russian language and primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries....
into Ukraine and through the adoption of the Russian language
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
by Ukrainians
Ukrainians
Ukrainians are an East Slavic ethnic group native to Ukraine, which is the sixth-largest nation in Europe. The Constitution of Ukraine applies the term 'Ukrainians' to all its citizens...
.
Russian settlers
The first new waves of Russian settlers onto what is now Ukrainian territory came in the late 16th century to the empty lands of Slobozhanschyna that RussiaTsardom of Russia
The Tsardom of Russia was the name of the centralized Russian state from Ivan IV's assumption of the title of Tsar in 1547 till Peter the Great's foundation of the Russian Empire in 1721.From 1550 to 1700, Russia grew 35,000 km2 a year...
gained from the Tatars
Golden Horde
The Golden Horde was a Mongol and later Turkicized khanate that formed the north-western sector of the Mongol Empire...
, although they were outnumbered by Ukrainian peasants escaping harsh exploitative conditions from the west.
More Russian speakers appeared in northern, central and eastern Ukrainian territories during the late 17th century, following the Cossack Rebellion
Khmelnytsky Uprising
The Khmelnytsky Uprising, was a Cossack rebellion in the Ukraine between the years 1648–1657 which turned into a Ukrainian war of liberation from Poland...
led by Bohdan Khmelnytsky
Bohdan Khmelnytsky
Bohdan Zynoviy Mykhailovych Khmelnytsky was a hetman of the Zaporozhian Cossack Hetmanate of Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth . He led an uprising against the Commonwealth and its magnates which resulted in the creation of a Cossack state...
. The Uprising led to a massive movement of Ukrainian settlers to the Slobozhanschyna region, which converted it from a sparsely inhabited frontier area to one of the major populated regions of the Tsardom of Russia
Tsardom of Russia
The Tsardom of Russia was the name of the centralized Russian state from Ivan IV's assumption of the title of Tsar in 1547 till Peter the Great's foundation of the Russian Empire in 1721.From 1550 to 1700, Russia grew 35,000 km2 a year...
. Following the Pereyaslav Rada the modern northern and eastern parts of Ukraine entered into the Russian Tsardom. This brought the first significant, but still small, wave of Russian settlers into central Ukraine (primarily several thousand soldiers stationed in garrisons, out of a population of approximately 1.2 million non-Russians). Although the number of Russian settlers in Ukraine prior to the eighteenth century was small, the local upper classes within the part of Ukraine acquired by Russia came to use the Russian language widely.
Beginning in the late eighteenth century, large numbers of Russians settled in newly acquired lands in southern Ukraine, a region then known as Novorossiya
Novorossiya
Novorossiya is a historic area of lands which established itself solidly after the annexation of the Crimean Khanate by the Russian Empire, but was introduced with the establishment of Novorossiysk Governorate with the capital in Kremenchuk in the mid 18th century. Until that time in both Polish...
("New Russia"). These lands had been largely empty prior to the eighteenth century due to the threat of Crimean Tatar
Crimean Khanate
Crimean Khanate, or Khanate of Crimea , was a state ruled by Crimean Tatars from 1441 to 1783. Its native name was . Its khans were the patrilineal descendants of Toqa Temür, the thirteenth son of Jochi and grandson of Genghis Khan...
raids, but once the Tatar state was eliminated as a threat, Russian nobles were granted large tracts of fertile land that was worked by newly arrived peasants, most of whom were ethnic Ukrainians but many of whom were Russians.
Dramatic increase of Russian settlers
The nineteenth century saw a dramatic increase in the urban Russian population in Ukraine, as ethnic Russian settlers moved into and populated the newly industrialized and growing towns. This phenomenon helped turn Ukraine's most important towns into Russophone environments. By the beginning of the 20th century the Russians were the largest ethnic group in almost all large cities within Ukraine's modern borders, including the following: KievKiev
Kiev or Kyiv is the capital and the largest city of Ukraine, located in the north central part of the country on the Dnieper River. The population as of the 2001 census was 2,611,300. However, higher numbers have been cited in the press....
(54.2%), Kharkiv
Kharkiv
Kharkiv or Kharkov is the second-largest city in Ukraine.The city was founded in 1654 and was a major centre of Ukrainian culture in the Russian Empire. Kharkiv became the first city in Ukraine where the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic was proclaimed in December 1917 and Soviet government was...
(63.1%), Odessa
Odessa
Odessa or Odesa is the administrative center of the Odessa Oblast located in southern Ukraine. The city is a major seaport located on the northwest shore of the Black Sea and the fourth largest city in Ukraine with a population of 1,029,000 .The predecessor of Odessa, a small Tatar settlement,...
(49.09%), Mykolaiv
Mykolaiv
Mykolaiv , also known as Nikolayev , is a city in southern Ukraine, administrative center of the Mykolaiv Oblast. Mykolaiv is the main ship building center of the Black Sea, and, arguably, the whole Eastern Europe.-Name of city:...
(66.33%), Mariupol
Mariupol
Mariupol , formerly known as Zhdanov , is a port city in southeastern Ukraine. It is located on the coast of the Azov Sea, at the mouth of the Kalmius River. Mariupol is the largest city in Priazovye - a geographical region around Azov Sea, divided by Russia and Ukraine - and is also a popular sea...
(63.22%), Luhansk
Luhansk
Luhansk also known as Lugansk is a city in southeastern Ukraine. It is the administrative center of the Luhansk Oblast . The city itself is also designated as its own separate municipality within the oblast...
, (68.16%), Kherson
Kherson
Kherson is a city in southern Ukraine. It is the administrative center of the Kherson Oblast , and is designated as its own separate raion within the oblast. Kherson is an important port on the Black Sea and Dnieper River, and the home of a major ship-building industry...
(47.21%), Melitopol
Melitopol
Melitopol is a city in the Zaporizhia Oblast of the southeastern Ukraine. It is situated on the Molochna River that flows through the eastern edge of the city and into the Molochnyi Liman, which eventually joins the Sea of Azov....
(42.8%), Dnipropetrovsk
Dnipropetrovsk
Dnipropetrovsk or Dnepropetrovsk formerly Yekaterinoslav is Ukraine's third largest city with one million inhabitants. It is located southeast of Ukraine's capital Kiev on the Dnieper River, in the south-central region of the country...
, (41.78%), Kirovohrad
Kirovohrad
Kirovohrad , formerly Yelisavetgrad, is a city in central Ukraine. It is located on the Inhul River. It is a motorway junction. Pop. 239,400 ....
(34.64%), Simferopol
Simferopol
-Russian Empire and Civil War:The city was renamed Simferopol in 1784 after the annexation of the Crimean Khanate to the Russian Empire by Catherine II of Russia. The name Simferopol is derived from the Greek, Συμφερόπολις , translated as "the city of usefulness." In 1802, Simferopol became the...
(45.64%), Yalta
Yalta
Yalta is a city in Crimea, southern Ukraine, on the north coast of the Black Sea.The city is located on the site of an ancient Greek colony, said to have been founded by Greek sailors who were looking for a safe shore on which to land. It is situated on a deep bay facing south towards the Black...
(66.17%), Kerch
Kerch
Kerch is a city on the Kerch Peninsula of eastern Crimea, an important industrial, transport and tourist centre of Ukraine. Kerch, founded 2600 years ago, is considered as one of the most ancient cities in Ukraine.-Ancient times:...
(57.8%), Sevastopol
Sevastopol
Sevastopol is a city on rights of administrative division of Ukraine, located on the Black Sea coast of the Crimea peninsula. It has a population of 342,451 . Sevastopol is the second largest port in Ukraine, after the Port of Odessa....
(63.46%). The Ukrainian migrants who settled in these cities entered a Russian-speaking milieu (particularly with Russian-speaking administration) and needed to adopt the Russian language.
Suppression of the Ukrainian language
The Russian governmentRussian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
promoted the spread of the Russian language among the native Ukrainian population by actively refusing to acknowledge the existence of the Ukrainian language. At the same time, most Ukrainian literature was printed in Moscow and Saint Petersburg.
Alarmed by the threat of Ukrainian separatism influenced by recent demands of Polish nationalists, the Russian Minister of Internal Affairs Pyotr Valuev
Pyotr Valuev
Count Pyotr Aleksandrovich Valuev , was a Russian statesman and writer.-Political career:...
in 1863 issued a secret decree that banned the publication of religious texts and educational texts written in the Ukrainian language as non-grammatical, but allowing all other texts, including fiction. This ban was expanded by Tsar Alexander II who issued the Ems Ukaz
Ems Ukaz
The Ems Ukaz, or Ems Ukase , was a secret decree of Tsar Alexander II of Russia issued in 1876, banning the use of the Ukrainian language in print, with the exception of reprinting of old documents. The ukaz also forbade the import of Ukrainian publications and the staging of plays or lectures in...
in 1876 (which lapsed in 1905). All Ukrainian language books and song lyrics were banned, as was the importation of such works. Furthermore, Ukrainian-language public performances, plays, and lectures were forbidden. In 1881, the decree was amended to allow the publishing of lyrics and dictionaries, and the performances of some plays in the Ukrainian language with local officials' approval. Ukrainian-only troupes were, however, forbidden. Approximately 9% of population spoke Russian at the time of the Russian Census of 1897.
The Soviet government adopted a policy of Ukrainization. Ukrainian cultural organizations, such as theatres or Writers' Union, were funded by central administration. While officially there was no state language in the Soviet Union until 1989, Russian was in practice in a privileged position, implicitly because it was the only language widely spoken across the country. The Ukrainian language, despite official encouragement and government funding, like other regional languages, was often frowned upon or quietly discouraged, which led to a gradual decline in its usage. From around 1960s all dissertations were required to be written in Russian only and submitted only in Moscow. That caused most scientific works to be written exclusively in Russian. Studying Russian in all schools was not an option, but the requirement and later in 1980s the teaching of it was ordered to be improved.
Modern usage
There is a large difference between the numbers of people whose native language is Russian and people who adopted Russian as their everyday communication language. Another thing to keep in mind is that the percentage of Russian-speaking citizens is significantly higher in cities than in rural areas across the whole country.2001 Census
Ukrainian Census (2001)
The first Ukrainian Census was carried out by State Statistics Committee of Ukraine on 5 December 2001, twelve years after the last Soviet Union census in 1989....
, the Russian language is native for over 14,273,000 Ukrainian citizens (29.3% of the total population). Ethnic Russians
Russians
The Russian people are an East Slavic ethnic group native to Russia, speaking the Russian language and primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries....
form 56% of the total Russian-speaking population, while the remaining Russophones are people of other ethnic background: 5,545,000 Ukrainians
Ukrainians
Ukrainians are an East Slavic ethnic group native to Ukraine, which is the sixth-largest nation in Europe. The Constitution of Ukraine applies the term 'Ukrainians' to all its citizens...
, 172,000 Belarusians
Belarusians
Belarusians ; are an East Slavic ethnic group who populate the majority of the Republic of Belarus. Introduced to the world as a new state in the early 1990s, the Republic of Belarus brought with it the notion of a re-emerging Belarusian ethnicity, drawn upon the lines of the Old Belarusian...
, 86,000 Jews
Jews
The Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are a nation and ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...
, 81,000 Greeks
Greeks
The Greeks, also known as the Hellenes , are a nation and ethnic group native to Greece, Cyprus and neighboring regions. They also form a significant diaspora, with Greek communities established around the world....
, 62,000 Bulgarians
Bulgarians
The Bulgarians are a South Slavic nation and ethnic group native to Bulgaria and neighbouring regions. Emigration has resulted in immigrant communities in a number of other countries.-History and ethnogenesis:...
, 46,000 Moldavians
Moldovans
Moldovans or Moldavians are the largest population group of Moldova...
, 43,000 Tartars, 43,000 Armenians
Armenians
Armenian people or Armenians are a nation and ethnic group native to the Armenian Highland.The largest concentration is in Armenia having a nearly-homogeneous population with 97.9% or 3,145,354 being ethnic Armenian....
, 22,000 Poles
Poles
thumb|right|180px|The state flag of [[Poland]] as used by Polish government and diplomatic authoritiesThe Polish people, or Poles , are a nation indigenous to Poland. They are united by the Polish language, which belongs to the historical Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages of Central Europe...
, 21,000 Germans
Germans
The Germans are a Germanic ethnic group native to Central Europe. The English term Germans has referred to the German-speaking population of the Holy Roman Empire since the Late Middle Ages....
, 15,000 Crimean Tartars.
Therefore the Russian-speaking population in Ukraine forms the largest linguistic group in modern Europe with its language being non-official in the state. The Russian-speaking population of Ukraine constitutes the largest Russophone
Russophone
A Russophone is literally a speaker of the Russian language either natively or by preference. At the same time the term is used in a more specialized meaning to describe the category of people whose cultural background is associated with Russian language regardless of ethnic and territorial...
community outside the Russian Federation.
Polls
According to a 2004 public opinion poll by the Kyiv International Institute of SociologyKyiv International Institute of Sociology
Kyiv International Institute of Sociology is a Ukrainian organization conducting sociological research in the following fields:* social and socioeconomic research* marketing research* political research* health studies...
, the number of people using Russian language in their homes considerably exceeds the number of those who declared Russian as their native language in the census. According to the survey, Russian is used at home by 43–46% of the population of the country (in other words a similar proportion to Ukrainian) and Russophone
Russophone
A Russophone is literally a speaker of the Russian language either natively or by preference. At the same time the term is used in a more specialized meaning to describe the category of people whose cultural background is associated with Russian language regardless of ethnic and territorial...
s make a majority of the population in Eastern and Southern regions of Ukraine:
- Autonomous Republic of CrimeaCrimeaCrimea , or the Autonomous Republic of Crimea , is a sub-national unit, an autonomous republic, of Ukraine. It is located on the northern coast of the Black Sea, occupying a peninsula of the same name...
— 97% of the population - Dnipropetrovsk OblastDnipropetrovsk OblastDnipropetrovsk Oblast is an oblast of central Ukraine, the most important industrial region of the country. Its administrative center is Dnipropetrovsk....
— 72% - Donetsk OblastDonetsk OblastDonetsk Oblast is an oblast of eastern Ukraine. Its administrative center is Donetsk. Historically, the province is an important part of the Donbas region...
— 93% - Zaporizhia OblastZaporizhia OblastZaporizhia Oblast is an oblast of southern Ukraine. Its capital is Zaporizhia.This oblast is an important part of Ukraine's industry and agriculture.-Geography:...
— 81% - Luhansk OblastLuhansk OblastLuhansk Oblast ) is the easternmost oblast of Ukraine. Its administrative center is Luhansk. The oblast was established in 1938 and bore the name Voroshilovgrad Oblast in honor of Kliment Voroshilov....
— 89% - Mykolaiv OblastMykolaiv OblastMykolaiv Oblast is an oblast of Ukraine. The administrative center of the oblast is the city of Mykolayiv.-Geography:The Mykolaiv Oblast is located in the southern half of Ukraine...
— 66% - Odessa OblastOdessa OblastOdesa Oblast, also written as Odessa Oblast , is the southernmost and largest oblast of south-western Ukraine. The administrative center of the oblast is the city of Odessa.-History:...
— 85% - Kharkiv OblastKharkiv OblastKharkiv Oblast is an oblast in eastern Ukraine. The oblast borders Russia to the north, Luhansk Oblast to the east, Donetsk Oblast to the south-east, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast to the south-west, Poltava Oblast to the west and Sumy Oblast to the north-west...
— 74%
Russian language dominates in informal communication in the capital of Ukraine, Kiev. It is also used by a sizeable linguistic minority (4-5% of the total population) in Central and Western Ukraine.
According to data obtained by the "Public opinion" foundation (2002), the population of the oblast
Oblast
Oblast is a type of administrative division in Slavic countries, including some countries of the former Soviet Union. The word "oblast" is a loanword in English, but it is nevertheless often translated as "area", "zone", "province", or "region"...
centres prefers to use Russian (75%). Continuous Russian linguistic areas occupy certain regions of Crimea, Donbass
Donets Basin
Donbas or Donbass , full rarely-used name Donets Basin , is a historical, economic and cultural region of eastern Ukraine. Originally a coal mining area, it has become a heavily industrialised territory suffering from urban decay and industrial pollution.-Geography:Donbas covers three...
, Slobozhanschyna, southern parts of Odessa and Zaporizhia oblasts, while Russian linguistic enclaves exist in central Ukraine and Bukovina
Bukovina
Bukovina is a historical region on the northern slopes of the northeastern Carpathian Mountains and the adjoining plains.-Name:The name Bukovina came into official use in 1775 with the region's annexation from the Principality of Moldavia to the possessions of the Habsburg Monarchy, which became...
.
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Internet
While government organizations are required to have their websites in Ukrainian, the Ukrainian section of the Internet is mostly Russian-speaking. For example, the Russian Wikipedia is 5 times more popular in Ukraine than the Ukrainian one. When searching for the keyword "авто" ("cars") in Ukrainian Google, 9 out of 10 most relevant pages are in Russian.Russian language in Ukrainian politics
Constitution of Ukraine
The Constitution of Ukraine is the nation's fundamental law. The constitution was adopted and ratified at the 5th session of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine on 28 June 1996. The constitution was passed with 315 ayes out of 450 votes possible .Other laws and other normative legal acts of Ukraine...
adopted by the parliament in 1996. Article 10 of the Constitution reads: "In Ukraine, the free development, use and protection of Russian, and other languages of national minorities of Ukraine, is guaranteed". The Constitution declares Ukrainian language as the state language of the country, while other languages spoken in Ukraine are guaranteed constitutional protection. The Ukrainian language was adopted as the state language by the Law on Languages adopted in Ukrainian SSR
Ukrainian SSR
The Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic or in short, the Ukrainian SSR was a sovereign Soviet Socialist state and one of the fifteen constituent republics of the Soviet Union lasting from its inception in 1922 to the breakup in 1991...
in 1989; Russian was specified as the language of communication with the other republics of Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
.
Ukraine signed the European Charter on Regional or Minority Languages in 1996, but ratified it only in 2002 when the Parliament
Verkhovna Rada
The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine is Ukraine's parliament. The Verkhovna Rada is a unicameral parliament composed of 450 deputies, which is presided over by a chairman...
adopted the law that partly implemented the charter. No specific laws have been adopted since then to define the territory of the Russian language and measures to protect it.
Second official language?
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Leonid Kuchma
Leonid Danylovych Kuchma was the second President of independent Ukraine from 19 July 1994, to 23 January 2005. Kuchma took office after winning the 1994 presidential election against his rival, incumbent Leonid Kravchuk...
, used their promise of making Russian a second state language to win support. The current President of Ukraine
President of Ukraine
Prior to the formation of the modern Ukrainian presidency, the previous Ukrainian head of state office was officially established in exile by Andriy Livytskyi. At first the de facto leader of nation was the president of the Central Rada at early years of the Ukrainian People's Republic, while the...
, Viktor Yanukovych
Viktor Yanukovych
Viktor Fedorovych Yanukovych is a Ukrainian politician who has been the President of Ukraine since February 2010.Yanukovych served as the Governor of Donetsk Oblast from 1997 to 2002...
continued this practice when he was opposition leader. But in an interview with Kommersant
Kommersant
Kommersant is a commerce-oriented newspaper published in Russia. , the circulation was 131,000.- History :The newspaper was initially published in 1909, and it was closed down following the Bolshevik seizure of power and the introduction of censorship in 1917.In 1989, with the onset of press...
during the 2010 Ukrainian presidential election
Ukrainian presidential election, 2010
The Ukrainian presidential election of 2010 is Ukraine's fifth presidential election since declaring independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. The first round was held on January 17, 2010...
-campaign he stated that the statued of Russian in Ukraine "is too politicized" and said that if elected President in 2010 he would "have a real opportunity to adopt a law on languages, which implements the requirements of the European Charter of regional languages". He implied these law would need 226 votes in the Ukrainian parliament (50% of the votes instead of the 75% of the votes needed to change the constitution of Ukraine
Constitution of Ukraine
The Constitution of Ukraine is the nation's fundamental law. The constitution was adopted and ratified at the 5th session of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine on 28 June 1996. The constitution was passed with 315 ayes out of 450 votes possible .Other laws and other normative legal acts of Ukraine...
). After his early 2010 election as President Yanukovych stated (on March 9, 2010) "Ukraine will continue to promote the Ukrainian language as its only state language". At the same time he stressed that it also necessary to develop other regional languages.
Former president Viktor Yushchenko
Viktor Yushchenko
Viktor Andriyovych Yushchenko is a former President of Ukraine. He took office on January 23, 2005, following a period of popular unrest known as the Orange Revolution...
, during his 2004 Presidential campaign
Ukrainian presidential election, 2004
The Ukrainian presidential election, 2004 was held on October 31, November 21 and December 26, 2004. The election was the fourth presidential election to take place in Ukraine following independence from the Soviet Union...
, also claimed a willingness to introduce more equality for Russian speakers. His clipping service spread an announcement of his promise to make Russian language proficiency obligatory for officials who interact with Russian-speaking citizens. In 2005 Yushchenko stated that he had never signed this decree project. The controversy was seen by some as a deliberate policy of Ukrainization
Ukrainization
Ukrainization is a policy of increasing the usage and facilitating the development of the Ukrainian language and promoting other elements of Ukrainian culture, in various spheres of public life such as education, publishing, government and religion.The term is used, most prominently, for the...
.
In 2006 the Kharkiv
Kharkiv
Kharkiv or Kharkov is the second-largest city in Ukraine.The city was founded in 1654 and was a major centre of Ukrainian culture in the Russian Empire. Kharkiv became the first city in Ukraine where the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic was proclaimed in December 1917 and Soviet government was...
City Rada was the first to declare Russian to be a regional language. Following that, almost all southern and eastern oblasts (Luhansk
Luhansk Oblast
Luhansk Oblast ) is the easternmost oblast of Ukraine. Its administrative center is Luhansk. The oblast was established in 1938 and bore the name Voroshilovgrad Oblast in honor of Kliment Voroshilov....
, Donetsk
Donetsk Oblast
Donetsk Oblast is an oblast of eastern Ukraine. Its administrative center is Donetsk. Historically, the province is an important part of the Donbas region...
, Mykolaiv
Mykolaiv Oblast
Mykolaiv Oblast is an oblast of Ukraine. The administrative center of the oblast is the city of Mykolayiv.-Geography:The Mykolaiv Oblast is located in the southern half of Ukraine...
, Kharkiv
Kharkiv Oblast
Kharkiv Oblast is an oblast in eastern Ukraine. The oblast borders Russia to the north, Luhansk Oblast to the east, Donetsk Oblast to the south-east, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast to the south-west, Poltava Oblast to the west and Sumy Oblast to the north-west...
, Zaporizhia
Zaporizhia Oblast
Zaporizhia Oblast is an oblast of southern Ukraine. Its capital is Zaporizhia.This oblast is an important part of Ukraine's industry and agriculture.-Geography:...
, and Kherson
Kherson Oblast
Kherson Oblast is an oblast in southern Ukraine, just north of Crimea. Its administrative center is Kherson. The area of the region is 29000 km², its population is 1.12 million.Important cities in the oblast include:...
oblasts), and major cities (Sevastopol
Sevastopol
Sevastopol is a city on rights of administrative division of Ukraine, located on the Black Sea coast of the Crimea peninsula. It has a population of 342,451 . Sevastopol is the second largest port in Ukraine, after the Port of Odessa....
, Dnipropetrovsk
Dnipropetrovsk
Dnipropetrovsk or Dnepropetrovsk formerly Yekaterinoslav is Ukraine's third largest city with one million inhabitants. It is located southeast of Ukraine's capital Kiev on the Dnieper River, in the south-central region of the country...
, Donetsk
Donetsk
Donetsk , is a large city in eastern Ukraine on the Kalmius river. Administratively, it is a center of Donetsk Oblast, while historically, it is the unofficial capital and largest city of the economic and cultural Donets Basin region...
, Yalta
Yalta
Yalta is a city in Crimea, southern Ukraine, on the north coast of the Black Sea.The city is located on the site of an ancient Greek colony, said to have been founded by Greek sailors who were looking for a safe shore on which to land. It is situated on a deep bay facing south towards the Black...
, Luhansk
Luhansk
Luhansk also known as Lugansk is a city in southeastern Ukraine. It is the administrative center of the Luhansk Oblast . The city itself is also designated as its own separate municipality within the oblast...
, Zaporizhia
Zaporizhia
Zaporizhia or Zaporozhye [formerly Alexandrovsk ] is a city in southeastern Ukraine, situated on the banks of the Dnieper River. It is the administrative center of the Zaporizhia Oblast...
, Kryvyi Rih
Kryvyi Rih
Kryvyi Rih or Krivoy Rog is a city in central Ukraine. It is situated in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, to the southwest of the oblast's administrative center, Dnipropetrovsk, at the confluence of the Inhulets and Saksahan rivers...
, Odessa
Odessa
Odessa or Odesa is the administrative center of the Odessa Oblast located in southern Ukraine. The city is a major seaport located on the northwest shore of the Black Sea and the fourth largest city in Ukraine with a population of 1,029,000 .The predecessor of Odessa, a small Tatar settlement,...
) followed suit. By ruling of several courts, decision to change the status of the Russian language in the cities of Kryvyi Rih, Kherson, Dnipropetrovsk, Zaporizhia and Mykolaiv have been overturned while in Donetsk, Mykolaiv and Kharkiv oblasts it was retained. According to survey by "Research and Branding group" (June, 2006) the majority of the interviewed supported the decisions of local authorities: 52% largely supported (including 69% of population of eastern oblasts and 56% of southern regions), 34% largely did not support the decisions, 9% - answered "partially support and partially not", 5% had no opinion.
According to an all-Ukrainian poll carried out in February 2008 by "Ukrainian Democratic Circle" 15% of those polled said that the language issue should be immediately solved, in November 2009 this was 14.7%; in the November 2009 poll 35.8% wanted both the Russian and Ukrainian language to be state languages.
Polls
Although officially Russian speakers comprise about 30% (2001 census), 39% of Ukrainians interviewed in a 2006 survey believe that the rights of Russophones are violated because the Russian language is not official in the country, whereas 38% had the opposite position.On a cross-national survey 0.5% of respondents felt they were discriminated against because of their language.
According to a poll carried out by the Social Research Center at the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy in late 2009
ideological issues were ranked third (15%) as reasons to organized mass protest actions (in particular, the issues of joining NATO, the status of the Russian language, the activities of left- and right-wing political groups, etc.); behind economic issues (25%) and problems of ownership (17%).
According to March 2010 survey, forced Ukrainization and Russian language suppression are of concern to 4.8% of the population.
Education in Russian
The Law on Education grants Ukrainian families (parents and their children) a right to choose their native language for schools and studies.The amount of Russian-teaching schools has been systematically reduced since 1991 and now it is much lower than the proportion of Russophones."Annual Report of the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights “On the situation with observance and protection of human rights and freedoms in Ukraine” for the period from April 14, 1998 till December 31, 1999"
The Russian language is still studied as a required course in all secondary schools, including those with Ukrainian as the primary language of instructions. The Ukrainian language
Ukrainian language
Ukrainian is a language of the East Slavic subgroup of the Slavic languages. It is the official state language of Ukraine. Written Ukrainian uses a variant of the Cyrillic alphabet....
is studied as a required course in all Russian language schools.
Russian in courts
Since January 1, 2010 it is allowed to hold court proceedingsJudicial system of Ukraine
The judicial system of Ukraine is outlined in the 1996 Constitution of Ukraine. Before this there was no notion of judicial review nor any Supreme Court since 1991's Ukrainian independence....
in Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
on mutual consent of parties. Citizens, who are unable to speak Ukrainian
Ukrainian language
Ukrainian is a language of the East Slavic subgroup of the Slavic languages. It is the official state language of Ukraine. Written Ukrainian uses a variant of the Cyrillic alphabet....
or Russian are allowed to use their native language or the services of an interpreter.
See also
- Russians in UkraineRussians in UkraineRussians in Ukraine form the largest ethnic minority in the country, and the community forms the largest single Russian diaspora in the world. In the 2001 Ukrainian census, 8,334,100 identified themselves as ethnic Russians ....
- Human Rights Public Movement "Russian-speaking UkraineRussian-speaking UkraineThe All-Ukrainian Non-government Organization “Human Rights Public Movement “Russian-speaking Ukraine” was founded on 1 March 2008 in Severodonetsk, Luhansk region during the II All-Ukrainian congress of deputies of all-level councils, and registered on 10 August 2009 by the Ministry of Justice...
", a non-governmental organisation based in Ukraine.