Russian govt submits bill to State Duma banning use of foreign words in state language, except those listed in normative dictionaries

MOSCOW. Oct 26 (Interfax) - The Russian government has submitted to the State Duma a draft bill on the unacceptability of using foreign words, except ones that have no generally accepted analogues in the Russian language contained in so-called normative dictionaries.

This concerns cases where Russian is used as the state language.

The legislative proposal has been published in the Duma legislative database.

According to the draft legislation, upon studying proposals from the governmental commission on the Russian language, the Russian government determines the procedure for forming and endorsing a list of normative dictionaries, guidebooks and grammar books, as well as requirements for the compiling of such dictionaries.

It is emphasized in the bill that the Russian language has a uniting role as the state language in the common multiethnic state of the Russian Federation. The proposed legislation expands and specifies spheres where the use of the state language is compulsory, an explanatory note attached to the bill says.

The proposed rules are aimed at protecting the Russian language from any excessive use of foreign words, it says.

If enacted, the legislation will help improve the general level of literacy amongst citizens, the accuracy of using the state language of the Russian Federation, ensure control over the quality of "the single corpus" of grammars, dictionaries, guidebooks, and the observance of the standards and rules of modern literary Russian by all officials, the bill's authors say in the note.