Ukrainians did not ban the Russian language, but established Ukrainian for official use

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The Cyrillic alphabet of the Ukrainian language Photo: FDRMRZUSACC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

This article was first published by Truthmeter.mk (North Macedonia), within the framework of Western Balkans Anti-Disinformation Project.

It is not true that Ukrainians have banned Russians from speaking Russian in Ukraine. In fact, the fact that some people in Ukraine speak Russian does not make them de facto Russians. Although in 2019 a law was passed in Ukraine that Ukrainian is the official language in Ukraine, Russian remains a widely used language in Ukraine in pop culture, informal and business communication. As the fact-checkers at PolitiFact write, in April 2019, the Ukrainian Parliament approved a language law that makes Ukrainian the official language for public sector employees in the country

 

We analyze a Facebook post which says the following:

Chashule has gone mad, jeez. He compares Russia with Bulgaria and us with Ukraine. Well, Kole, don’t be silly, we are neither Ukrofascists nor did the Russians ban their language, but the opposite happened. The Ukrainians and the Russians (35% of the population in Ukraine) were banned from their language and church.

It is not true that Ukrainians have banned Russians from speaking Russian in Ukraine. In truth, the fact that some people in Ukraine speak Russian does not make them de facto Russians. Although in 2019 a law was passed in Ukraine that Ukrainian is the official language in Ukraine, Russian remains a widely used language in Ukraine in pop culture, informal and business communication. As the fact-checkers of PolitiFact write, in April 2019, the Parliament of Ukraine approved a law on the language, according to which Ukrainian is the official language for public sector employees in the country.

 

Law on the Ukrainian language as a state language

The adoption of this law requires citizens to know the Ukrainian language and public servants, soldiers, doctors, and teachers to communicate in Ukrainian. Some exceptions are made in the law for some minority languages, such as English and other EU languages. Russian does not fall into this category, fact-checkers at PolitiFact write.

 

Since Russia launched its unprovoked military invasion of Ukraine in 2022, many Ukrainians have given up speaking Russian as a sign of resistance, Kyiv Independent reported in a recent article, noting that many Ukrainians continue to speak both Ukrainian and Russian. According to the outlet, speaking Russian in Ukraine is a consequence of centuries of Russification under the Soviet Union.

For the majority of them, speaking Russian is not an expression of allegiance to Russia. But for the Kremlin, the Russian language has become an increasingly powerful propaganda tool, used to portray Russian-speaking Ukrainians as signaling a desire to join with Russia, Kyiv Independent states.

The media outlet says Ukrainian began to be spoken by more people after the collapse of the Soviet Union, but it was not until the 2013-2014 EuroMaidan Revolution (also known as the Revolution of Dignity), followed by Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea and its invasion of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, that the state began actively promoting the use of the Ukrainian language.

In 2019, the Ukrainian government passed a law to ensure that Ukrainian is the state language. Contrary to some deliberate misinterpretations, the law was not enacted to ban Russian in Ukraine, but to increase the use of Ukrainian in the public sphere, writes Kyiv Independent, adding that some Ukrainians have stopped speaking Russian so as not to justify Russia’s excuse for starting a war in which they themselves are victims. Al Jazeera also reports on similar moves of resistance.

As Voice of America reported after the language law was passed, it also meant that all businesses, organizations, and stores were required to serve consumers and provide information about goods and services in Ukrainian. However, the information could be translated into other languages ​​and could be spoken in another language at the customer’s request.

 

Why do some Ukrainians also speak Russian?

In a survey by Rating (an independent research organization based in Kyiv, Rating Sociological Group) conducted from August 16 to 20, 2023 among 6,050 people living in Ukraine, to the question “What language do you speak at home”—59 percent of respondents answered that they speak only Ukrainian in everyday life, 31 percent both Ukrainian and Russian, and 9 percent that they speak mainly Russian in everyday life.

From December 4 to 27, 2022, the International Institute of Sociology, a private research center based in Kyiv, conducted a survey of 2,005 respondents in Ukraine. Of these, 58 percent said they communicate exclusively or mostly in Ukrainian, and 15 percent said they communicate exclusively or mostly in Russian. Another 24 percent said they use both languages ​​equally, Voice of America reports.

 

Map of the population by dominant mother tongue in Ukraine, 2001: Ukrainian is in blue Photo: Lvivske ,CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The part of the article that mentions “Ukrofascists” corresponds with pro-Kremlin propaganda aimed at justifying the war that Russia has started in Ukraine, a sovereign, independent state with a democratically elected leadership. More than 300 historians who study genocide, Nazism, and World War II have signed a declaration stating that Putin’s rhetoric about “denazification of fascists” is propaganda.

The current Ukrainian government is not fascist, nor dictatorial, nor in any way connected to the Nazi past. President Volodymyr Zelensky was democratically elected in fair elections, receiving 73 percent of the vote in the 2019 presidential election.

Jeffrey Veidlinger says for Time:
At one point, there were some Ukrainians who collaborated with Nazis. This is why Putin can use that term, because it has resonance and people are familiar with this history of Ukraine having sympathies with the Nazis, but this was 80 years ago, and isn’t reflective of the current Ukrainian Government…It’s a meaningless term when Putin uses it. He’s not afraid of Nazis in Ukraine. He’s afraid of democracy in Ukraine. And he recognizes that as democracy encroaches upon Russia as it comes closer to Russia, there’s a threat that those people will demand democracy.

As a reminder, Ukraine banned the promotion of Nazism in 2015. There are indeed right-wing extremist forces in Ukraine, but they are weak compared to other European countries. In other words, the Nazi groups that exist in modern Ukraine, as well as in other European countries, have no influence on parliament, are not in government, and cannot be a justification for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

 

Which church is banned in Ukraine?

In the part of the post where it is claimed that “Ukraine has banned the church,” it is important to note that this is not a ban on the Orthodox Church, but a ban on the Russian church affiliated with Moscow – the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate, which is subordinate to the Russian Orthodox Church. As Kyiv claims, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church – Moscow Patriarchate (UPC) is directly affiliated with and supported by the Russian Orthodox Church, and therefore the authorities have prepared a draft law to ban it, or to allow it to re-register, i.e. to form a new church that will not be in any way affiliated with the Russian Orthodox Church and Patriarch Kirill.

The ban followed the revelation that the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate was spreading Russian propaganda, covering up the activities of enemy services, and recruiting Russian agents. The reason for this move by the Zelensky government was also that the Russian Orthodox Church openly supported the Russian military invasion of Ukraine and officially called it a “special operation.”

In April 2025, Ukraine’s secret service formally charged 14 high-ranking metropolitans and archbishops of the Russian Orthodox Church with their participation in the illegal appropriation of Ukrainian churches in the territories of Ukraine occupied by Russia.

The part of the post that refers to the comparison between North Macedonia and Bulgaria with Ukraine and Russia represents a personal opinion that is not subject to a fact-checking methodology.

Due to all the above facts, we assess the post we are reviewing as untrue.