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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has signed two laws that strictly strengthen his country’s national identity, ban Russian place names and make knowledge of the Ukrainian language and history a requirement for citizenship.
The move late Friday was the latest move by Ukraine to shake off a long legacy of Russian dominance, a subject that has become increasingly emotional since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine last year.
Already, countless streets in Ukraine have been renamed and statues of Russian figures like Catherine the Great have been torn down. While these efforts to eliminate the old Russian name have been ongoing since the fall of the Soviet Union, they have intensified since the war began in February 2022. in a process called “de-Russification.”
The new law signed by Mr. Zelensky on Friday bans the use of place names that “perpetuate, promote or symbolize the country of occupation or places, cities, dates, events,” and “figures who have carried out military. aggression against Ukraine.”
Vakhtang Kebuladze, professor of philosophy at Taras Shevhchenko National University in Kyiv, says the time has come. He, like many other Ukrainian intellectuals, supported the removal of Russian names, even those of great writers like Leo Tolstoy.
“It’s not about literature,” Mr. Kebuladze said on Saturday. “This is about Russia’s imperialistic presence in our streets and cities.”
“We should read Tolstoy, we should investigate his literature. But why should we have Leo Tolstoy Street in the center of Kyiv? he added.
(In March, Kyiv changed Leo Tolstoy Street to Hetman Pavlo Skoropadskyi Street, after the Ukrainian leader from the early 20th century.)
Mr Kebuladze also welcomed the new citizenship law signed by Mr Zelensky on Friday which requires knowledge of the Ukrainian language and history.
Many Ukrainians are native Russian speakers – including Mr Zelensky. About one in three Ukrainians speak Russian at home, according to researchers, but many – angered by the violence of the Russian invasion – have switched to Ukrainian as a show of defiance.
But Mr. Kebuladze, who speaks Ukrainian, Russian and Georgian, said it’s OK for people to continue to say what they want to do next.
“It’s not about personal language,” Mr. Kebuladze said.
“We only have one state language, Ukrainian,” he said. “And if people want to be citizens, they must know this language. It is part of our identity, our culture, our history.
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