- MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia's
parliament has given final approval to a law banning the use of foreign
or offensive words, which have been used by President Vladimir Putin and
other politicians to spice up public addresses.
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- The State Duma lower house overwhelmingly approved a
bill entrenching Russian as the "state language" and barring
"offensive", "obscene" and "vulgar" words.
Foreign words are also outlawed when Russian-language equivalents exist.
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- The legislation provided no specific penalties for offenders
and will probably have little effect on the tendency of public figures
to use off-colour phrases, mostly to their advantage.
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- Putin launched a 1999 drive against Chechen rebels by
vowing to "wipe them out in the shithouse". He then chose not
to campaign in the 2000 election he easily won, saying he would not treat
politics like trying to sell "Snickers and Tampax".
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- Allegations of Russian atrocities in Muslim Chechnya
again prompted him to tell a French journalist last November that anyone
wishing to become a Muslim extremist could undergo circumcision in Moscow
"in such a way that nothing grows back".
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- Russian nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky, a deputy speaker
of the Duma, also resorts to off-colour expressions and was seen on television
last week denouncing U.S. policy in Iraq -- with much of his remarks blotted
out.
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- Deputies rejected a proposal by the liberal Yabloko group
to remove Zhirinovsky from his post as a result of his outburst.
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- They also easily persuaded liberals to drop suggestions
that the law would impinge on press freedom by outlawing feature films
where dialogue included unrefined, countryside speech.
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- Nikolai Gubenko, a former culture minister, said no ban
would apply if the terms were "part of the creative process".
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