MOSCOW, August 2. /TASS/. A bill that introduces fines for playing Russian-language music in public places has been submitted to Ukraine’s parliament, Verkhovna Rada.
The text of the document, published by the parliament on Tuesday, says that "public use" and "public demonstration" of "audio and video records, their elements and other prohibited content shall be punishable with a fine that equals between 300 and 500 untaxed minimum incomes for citizens."
A repeated offense will be punishable by a fine equaling between 1,000 and 1,500 untaxed minimum incomes for citizens.
On June 19, 2022, the parliament introduced a prohibition on Russian-language songs, books and other creative products in public places. Also, Russian performers were barred from touring Ukraine.
Ukraine adopted a course toward the open eradication of the Russian language immediately after the coup in February 2014. Right after the new government came to power, the Verkhovna Rada (Ukraine’s parliament - TASS) voted to abolish the law, in effect since 2012, granting Russian the status of a regional language in those areas where it is spoken by at least 10% of the population. The revocation of this law was one of the reasons for the emergence of the protest movement in eastern Ukraine, where the population is predominantly Russian-speaking.
Since 2016, Ukraine has been introducing language quotas for radio and television, and in 2017 the Verkhovna Rada passed a new version of the law "On Education," which called for gradually banning the Russian language in the country’s educational system. On May 15, 2019, then-Ukrainian President Pyotr Poroshenko signed the law "On Ensuring the Functioning of the Ukrainian Language as the State Language," which further restricted the use of Russian and introduced fines and an entire range of penalties for violating the language law. Since February 2022, these processes have only intensified, with local authorities introducing complete bans on the use of Russian and the teaching of Russian in schools.