Ukrainian representative to UN Oleg Nikolenko called Russian request for UN Security Council meeting an “absurd”, insisting recent language law imposing Ukrainian unique status is no different to similar legislation in the other countries. Is it?
Ten years of prison for an attempt to establish multilingualism, and three year sentence for failure to use Ukrainian language in public institutions. Where language laws amount to such a Draconian practice? In what modern state there is such a supervising instance of powerful language inspectors, resembling Inquisition with extraordinary powers to repress?
However the totalitarianism of language law is impossible to understand without the context of the contemporary Ukrainian nationalist ideology, resurrecting fascist collaborator, and terrorist Stepan Bandera, glorified by President Yushchenko (2010) claiming his “sanctity“.
The “resurrection” of Nazi criminal Bandera has drawn the vector of development for contemporary Ukrainian nationalist idea, opening the tragic sequence of events from violent Maidan coup d’état, to Donbass conflict, and Odessa massacre.
The imposition of Bandera cult, marked a clean break from the humanist tradition of Ukrainian national idea of the XIX century, reflected in poetry of Taras Shevchenko and Lesya Ukrainka. Modern Ukrainian political elites could turn for inspiration to their heritage, developing national idea through creative spiritual growth, but they have chosen otherwise.
Ukrainian language law nr. 5670 enters open confrontation with the Article 27 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights announcing individuals of linguistic minorities cannot be denied the right to use their own language.
Linguistic rights were first included as an international human right in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948.
Anna Van Densky blog 