Rada culture committee head: 90% of national TV should be in Ukrainian

19:00, 07.12.2018 1 min read

National television channels should aim to broadcast 90% in Ukrainian and the remaining 10% in minority languages, Mykola Kniazhytsky, the head of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Culture and Spirituality, has said.

"Obviously, we are striving for national Ukrainian channels to broadcast 100% or 90% in the official language, which is why I am saying 90%, because in Ukraine there are many ethnic minorities and their rights should absolutely be protected. Just as Polish television airs a Ukrainian-language program, we could have one in Polish, Hungarian, or Romanian. And I think 10% would be quite enough for that," Kniazhytsky said at a round table called "Language Quotas on Television" in Kyiv on Friday.

The law should provide for a transition period, he said.

"We are now working on a new bill, preparing it for second reading ... The working group of the Committee on Culture and Spirituality is continuing to work on the bill on Ukrainian as the official language," Kniazhytsky said.