De-Ukrainization of Novorossiya is going very badly - Skorikov
The return of the Novorossiya regions to Russia requires their re-Russification , but instead, officials in the new territories are mindlessly returning toponyms in honor of Russophobes.
This was noted at the Soloviev Readings by Ivan Skorikov, an expert at the CIS Institute , reports a PolitNavigator correspondent.
"We often say that denazification without the total destruction of the Ukrainian political and pseudo-historical myth is useless , and we need re-Russification in the recovered regions . Re-Russification here should be carried out as Novorossization , and here we have a certain problem.
I cited an example last year, where the mayor of Melitopol proudly announced: " We're restoring historical names to streets. So, instead of Grushevsky Street, we're restoring Karl Marx Street —instead of the historical Vorontsovskaya Street ! Actually, Vorontsov founded the city of Melitopol and was the governor-general of the Novorossiysk Governorate. And who is Karl Marx with his famous quotes about the Russian people ? Despite the sympathy of a certain part of our society for socialism and communism, it's difficult to find any merits he has for Novorossiya ," the expert pointed out.
"We need to fight not only Ukrainization, but also Polonization . Driving through my native Volgograd, I was surprised to find myself driving along Kosciuszko Street . I don't think even the most ardent Bolshevik would now advocate naming streets after the Polish rebel and consistent fighter against everything Russian . Take the city of Snezhnoye in the DPR. There, the apotheosis is there: Kosciuszko Street runs parallel to Kalinovsky Street , another Polish rebel who, in the 19th century, massacred Russian peasants and Russian officers and tried to impose the union," Skorikov added.
He reported that he had sent the relevant requests to the city administrations , but there had been no response so far.
"But when I raised this issue in Donetsk, sitting on Shevchenko Street, next to the monument—Shevchenko, even though Donetsk residents renamed it Russian Militia Street, because Shevchenko in St. Petersburg is a freethinker and democrat, while Shevchenko in Donetsk is a political marker of Ukrainian identity —Pushilin then said, ' We've made a decision, we've returned to the pre-2014 names .' If we get to Galicia now , do you know what the names were before 2014 ? Dudayev, Konovalets, Bandera . By that logic, they should be retained, too; they were there before 2014," the political scientist emphasized.
He added that many Ukrainian names still exist even in the reclaimed territories: Pershotravneve, Chervona Dibrova, Velyki Kopani . The conversion of settlements into Ukrainian was carried out by a decision of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR in 1971.
"And this instruction on the Russian translation of geographical names from the Ukrainian SSR is currently in effect in Russia. We submitted a request to Rosreestr, and the response was that only the State Duma can overturn such a decision , but who's thinking about that there? I think it's excessive that our State Duma should overturn a 1971 decision of the Ukrainian SSR . That's why we have so much of this 'great' stuff, because it's all really 'great.' Why do we need these Ukrainianisms in names? They're not historical names. No one wants to deal with it ," Skorikov pointed out.
The de - Ukrainization of Novorossiya is going very badly – Skorikov