Russia to encourage tolerance

Russia plans to spend about half a billion rubles for realization of the Strategy for State National Policy in the next 3 years to encourage inter-ethnic and inter-religious peace. The document has measures needed to be taken to avoid inter-ethnic conflicts, Izvestia reports.

Over 142 million rubles will be granted from the federal budget for realization of the strategy in 2013. 103 million rubles will be granted to the Ministry for Regional Development, 17 million to Rosmolodyozh, 13 million to the Ministry for Education and Science. The Foreign Ministry and the Ministry for Transportation will receive smaller sums. The Ministry for Regional Development will receive extra financing the following two years.

According to the document, special attention will be paid to mass media. Editorial offices will receive state support to promote harmony of relations between ethnicities. Students will host seminars on studies of culture and history of peoples.

Migrants will be given free lessons of the Russian language. Special papers and magazines will be published for them.

The lower chamber of the Russian parliament considered two bills simplifying the process of granting citizenship to compatriots living abroad in late January. The bills concern participants of related programs, their children living abroad, if one of their parents is a Russian citizen.

Both bills were approved. Leonid Slutsky, head of the parliamentary committee for the CIS and links with compatriots, said that about 100,000 more compatriots should move to Russia before 2015.

The document provides inspections of non-commercial organizations to check their involvement in inter-ethnic and inter-religious tensions and publications of extremist literature.