“Russia has always been multinational” - Putin

Any attempt to promote the idea of a mono-ethnic state in Russia contradicts its thousands years old history, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin wrote in an article published Monday in the Nezavisimaya Gazeta paper.  Putin is confident that any talk about the discrimination against the Russian people simply shows that the state institutions fail to implement their tasks properly. Mr. Putin also admitted that the national policy has no simple solutions and reforming it directly reflects on all spheres of people’s lives.

The issue of nationalism is one of the main challenges modern states are facing nowadays, Putin says. For Russia this issue is especially relevant because due to historical experience many political forces are trying to use the idea of nationalism to pursue their own goals. According to Putin, there are attempts to destroy Russia using the same methods which were used for the destruction of the USSR. In this particular case it concerns false claims about the need to destroy the Empire, which freeloads at the expense of the Russian people.  The Russian people and the Russian culture are the core of the unique Russian civilization, the article reads. In this context the role of education as a tool for the regulation of interethnic relations, is enormous, Putin concludes. We hear from a political analyst Mikhail Remizov:

"We can only welcome that the Russian leadership is not afraid of speaking about such issues. This article is a well-written humanitarian document with a sound position. I don’t share all the approaches mentioned in the article but I support many activities it proposes. For example, a more significant role of such subjects at school as the Russian language and literature which are crucial for the civil socialization as well as tougher measures for failing to implement migration policy laws.  I don’t remember any other case when Putin attempted to speak up so consistently on such acute issues in a dialogue with those with whom he often does not agree."

One of the central topics of Putin’s article was migration policy and how it should be implemented in Russia. Putin states that multiculturalism as a regulation policy led only to the creation of isolated national and religious communities in the Western countries. This approach has proved to be inefficient, Remizov says:

"No doubt the Western policy of multiculturalism has failed. Its idea was that it is possible to ensure political and legal integration of the society without cultural integration.  But common legal and political values are based on the platform of common cultural experience, on what is linked with national identity of concrete European nations.  This legal and political integration is impossible without partial or complete assimilation of immigrants."

Putin’s article in the Nezavisimaya Gazeta is his second publication on the issues of the state system. This series of articles is part of his electoral program as a presidential candidate. Putin’s previous article was published in the Izvestia newspaper in mid-January and dealt mainly with social issues.  The next article is expected to deal with economic issues.

Information source: http://english.ruvr.ru/2012/01/23/64446678.html