On the Principles of State Language Policy
2012 Ukrainian legislation
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"On the Principles of State Language Policy" (Ukrainian: Закон України «Про засади державної мовної політики»), also nicknamed the "Kivalov-Kolesnichenko Law" after its proposers, is a Law of Ukraine that expanded the use of regional languages in Ukraine for those with at least 10% usage in a certain region, mainly to protect the Russian language in Ukraine.
| On the Principles of State Language Policy | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Verkhovna Rada | |
| |
| Territorial extent | Ukraine |
| Passed by | Presidential decree |
| Passed | 3 July 2012 |
| Effective | 10 August 2012 |
| Legislative history | |
| Introduced by | Serhii Kivalov, Vadym Kolesnichenko |
| First reading | 5 June 2012 |
| Voting summary |
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| Second reading | 3 July 2012 |
| Voting summary |
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| Amends | |
| "On Languages in the Ukrainian SSR" | |
| Amended by | |
| "On protecting the functioning of the Ukrainian language as the state language" | |
| Status: Struck down | |
On 7 February 2012, the bill was first introduced by MPs Serhii Kivalov and Vadym Kolesnichenko, and had the registration number 9073.[1]
On 5 June 2012, the Verkhovna Rada adopted the law in first reading with 234 votes in favor,[2] though some claimed only 172 voted in favor.[3] On 3 July, the second reading passed with 248 votes in favor [4] in violation of legislative procedures.[5] On 31 July, despite previous statements against doing so, the chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Volodymyr Lytvyn signed the bill.[6] On 8 August, president Viktor Yanukovych also signed the bill, it came into effect two days later on the 10th.[7]
On 23 February 2014, the Verkhovna Rada passed a motion repealing this law as invalid.[8] The next day, the High Commissioner on National Minorities from the OSCE Astrid Thors expressed concern that the repeal of this Law could lead to further unrest.[9] The following week, acting president Oleksandr Turchynov announced his refusal to approve the repeal.[10] Later on, newly-elected president Petro Poroshenko also called this repeal attempt a mistake, stressing other ways to improve language policy.[11]
On 29 February 2018, the Constitutional Court of Ukraine declared this law unconstitutional and struck it down.[12] The following year, this law was replaced by "On protecting the functioning of the Ukrainian language as the state language".