The rest of my 3 messages a day quota goes to Kelley, if she decides she needs it. Elena ----- Original Message ----- From: Chris Burford <cburford at gn.apc.org> To: <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com> Sent: Sunday, December 10, 2000 3:16 PM Subject: Soviet anthem restored?
> Has anyone got details on the decision to restore the old Soviet anthem as
> the Russian anthem.
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#3 BBC Monitoring Restoration of Soviet anthem splits Russian society Source: NTV International, Moscow, in Russian 1635 gmt 8 Dec 00
The "Vox Populi" live programme on Russian NTV turned into a heated discussion of state symbols and Russia's national idea following the restoration by the State Duma today of the Soviet-period national anthem. Participants in the programme expressed different, often opposing, views. The programme began by the restored anthem being played in the audience and about half of the people stood up while the rest remained seated.
Irina Khakamada, deputy speaker of the State Duma and a leader of the Union of Right Forces movement, expressed strong opposition to the restoration of the Soviet anthem. She said about 4m people had been convicted in Russia between 1921 and 1954 on charges of committing counterrevolutionary crimes: "I speak on behalf of this minority - it pains their relatives, it pains them and their children like me - my grandfather was killed and my grandmother committed suicide by hanging herself - to hear this anthem. If the state believes that it is above the fate of these people and is not going to take into account the life of every individual in the future, let this anthem be. It will be a reminder that nothing has changed in Russia."
Another participant in the discussion, film director Karen Shakhnazarov objected: "Yes, different pages of our history are connected with this anthem. But it is our history, which I indeed don't want to forget. Yes, Stalin and repressions are associated with this anthem, but also Victory Day and the flight of Yuriy Gagarin."
Prominent actress Svetlana Druzhinina expressed her view: "The thing is it is very important for me to support the president whom I trust, otherwise I will lose my self respect."
Well-known television presenter Sergey Dorenko joined in the debate: "The anthem splits society. As has already been said here, today is such a moment that it is dangerous to split society, it is still dangerous to do so after 10 or 15 years of reforms. It is dangerous but it has been done. It was done by politicians, by intelligent people."
Author Vladimir Voynovich said that 30 per cent of the population were against the restoration of the Soviet anthem: "The point is that 30 per cent are adamantly against this anthem. And this is already an argument. For whatever reason but it is very important that a huge part of society is against. So, one should stop and think."
A religious figure, Father Aleksandr said: "We should understand what we are building. Either we are building a new Russia which will be democratic, in which the view of an individual will be respected, in which life will be decent and of whom the whole world won't be afraid despite its nuclear bomb, and which is a kind, normal, cultural and rich country. Or we want to rehabilitate comrade Stalin and the Soviet Union and say that not everything was bad in it, that something was good in it.
There was something good in Fascist Germany too: people loved, got married, gave birth to children, went to work, there were jobs, there were sunrises and sunsets, everything was fine. The same applies to the Soviet Union.
But we must realize that we should either say that it was a terrible system which took millions of lives but which we want to rehabilitate now, or we indeed should say that we want to build a new Russia on new foundations."
A young girl expressed a view: "I want to say that it is very dangerous to follow the view of the authorities because the authoritues are immoral if they ignore the opinion of a minority. And this minority is millions of people. Today the Duma adopted the anthem not of the motherland but of the authorities."
Prominent actor Oleg Bashilashvili expressed the view of many people in the audience: "Why did we have to do it now, why did we have to adopt the anthem which divides us?"