The Ukrainian parliament has voted to ban the distribution of Russian books and the performance or performance of Russian music by post-Soviet artists, the latest manifestation of Kyiv’s harsh distancing from Russian culture.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has yet to sign the bills. Both bills received broad support from legislators across the political spectrum. Reuters reported.
Laws will not ban all Russian media. They only block the work of artists who received Russian citizenship after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.
One law prohibits the playing of Russian-language music in public, on television and radio. The same law also increases national quotas for Ukrainian-language music and TV and radio performances.
Another law prohibits the printing of books written by Russian citizens, unless the authors decide to give up their Russian passports and become citizens of Ukraine. It also blocks the import or distribution of books printed in Russia, Belarus and the occupied territory of Ukraine.
“Administrative responsibility has been established for the import and distribution of publishing products from Russia and Belarus, as well as literature included in the Register of Anti-Ukrainian Publishing Products,” the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine said on Twitter. said on Sunday evening.
This is just the latest attempt by Ukraine to control the language within its borders. In 2019, the government made Ukrainian a mandatory language used in most aspects of public life, including in schools. Russia pointed to this law before the invasion to prove that Russian-speaking Ukrainians were being attacked.
After the adoption of this law, human rights organizations urged Ukraine to protect the rights of speakers of minority languages. They became alarmed again when the Zelenskiy government in January began requiring print media to register in Ukraine. publish in Ukrainian.
Researchers estimate that every third Ukrainian speaks Russian at home. Ukraine’s large Russian-speaking population is a legacy of centuries of domination by its more powerful neighbor. Many Russian-speaking Ukrainians, outraged by the brutality of the Russian invasion, are switching to Ukrainian as a sign of defiance.