Russian World Conference of Compatriots, to put it mildly, untruth about Ukraine

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Valeriy Chalyi, director of international programs of the Razumkov Centre, commenting to UKRIFORM correspondent on today's statement of Moscow Mayor Yuriy Luzhkov at the World Conference of Compatriots Residing Abroad, running in the Russian capital, said that Yuriy Luzhkov "to put it mildly, says untruth with regard to Ukraine and mistakes the wish for the reality".

According to Chalyi, the similar rhetoric about supposedly increase of the wave of Russophobia in Ukraine and about the fact that Russia treats CIS countries "too mildly" as well as the need to strengthen pro-Russian movement in Donbas may be heard from other high officials in Kremlin. That is, "the matter concerns implementation of a whole complex of misinformation," the politologist said.

Valeriy Chalyi denied another "basic" statement distributed by Russian politicians that Ukraine supposedly oppresses rights of ethnic Russians that constitute almost one third here. In fact, 17 million of Russians do not live in Ukraine as Luzhkov and Premier Putin state. 17% of Ukraine's populations are Russians which is at least 8 million people.

Second, statements about Russophobia are untrue. According to data of researches, Razumkov Center and other institutions, at present Ukrainian citizens take Russia as the top-friendly state. Besides, most citizens express their support of the priority of development of Ukrainian-Russian relations.

The third lie concerns the fact that most Ukrainian citizens speak Russian and consider it to be their native language. At present Ukraine faces the normal process of "leveling the situation" and today only about one fourth of Ukrainian population consider Russian to be their native language. This is reliable information, Chalyi underscored.

The politologist is also convinced that it is not correct to speak about "mass process of closing Russian-speaking schools" as parents may appeal to institutions of the Ministry of Education and Science regarding non-closing or opening of classes with Russian language of education. But, for instance, in Kyiv, there were almost no initiatives like this.

Unfortunately, phobias and stereotypes are prevailing over the Russian political elite just like over the Ukrainian one, Valeriy Chalyi noted. He connects actions of particular Ukrainian political forces in the context of defending pro-Russian positions with significant monetary support from the Russian party. These programs receive significant financing from the Russian budget, so politicians should "justify" their activities in order to further claim to this "piece of pie", he said. At present these funds could be channeled for overcoming the crisis and social needs of Russians.

To my opinion, Russia should now think first about own problems and after that about "compatriots" from Venezuela to Australia, Valeriy Chalyi claimed. He also reminded that Russia's law on compatriots which refers to "compatriots" everyone who was born on the territory of the former USSR is very "doubtful".

UKRINFORM