MOSCOW, February 11. /TASS/. The State Duma has passed a bill in its first reading aimed at protecting the Russian language, including provisions requiring public signage and notices to be in Russian.
The bill, authored by Maxim Topilin, Chairman of the Duma Committee on Economic Policy, was submitted by a group of deputies in 2023. It seeks to amend several laws.
The law On Consumer Rights Protection is to be supplemented with an article on information intended for consumers — the type of goods and services, promotions, discounts, sales and benefits, functioning of an organization. According to the draft law, such information must be provided in Russian.
Also, the official language of the subjects of the Russian Federation, the language of the peoples of Russia, and a foreign language may be used, but the translation must match the Russian exactly. "Thus, words like 'coffee', 'fresh', 'sale', 'shop', 'open' on signage and storefronts will no longer be allowed," the explanatory note says.
The bill will not apply to brand names and trademarks.
The bill also proposes to amend the law On Participation in the Shared Construction of Apartment Buildings and Other Real Estate and on Amendments to Some Legislative Acts of the Russian Federation. The bill also stipulates using Russian in the commercial designation of capital construction facilities and residential complexes. "The draft law is aimed at ending the practice of naming residential complexes and towns (neighborhoods, neighborhoods) in foreign languages or using derivatives of foreign words and expressions," the explanatory note says.
Advertising and media
Besides, the bill proposes to amend the law On Advertising, specifying that information in the languages of the peoples of the Russian Federation and in foreign languages in an advertisement should be identical to the information in the advertisement made in the official language of the Russian Federation.
The law On Mass Media is also to be amended, supplementing it with the norm on broadcasting information programs on television and radio channels in Russian. In the case of broadcasting blocks of regional programs, the official languages of the republics and other languages of the peoples of the Russian Federation may be used. Similar norms are proposed to be fixed in the law On the Procedure for Covering the Activities of Public Authorities in the State Mass Media."
The explanatory note says that the proposed changes are aimed at ensuring compliance with the norms of the modern Russian literary language when broadcasting information programs on TV channels and radio, to eliminate speech and lexical errors of the presenters.
"The bill is important. The state language is the basis of national identity. Such issues should be approached carefully, understanding how the norms of the law will be implemented after its adoption," State Duma Chairman Vyacheslav Volodin said earlier.