Dear employees of international organizations, colleagues, and friends!

June 6 is UN Russian Language Day. Often we perceive language as a given, as a way of communication. But the concept of language is much wider - it forms a map of our thinking, paints a picture of the world, preserves the identity of parents and children, allows us to build and implement plans, sets the trajectory for future development.

The language explains the content of the conceptual picture of the world, outlines its shape, recorded through many symbols and signs. Each language sets its own accents and fixes the contours of the surrounding reality, specifically significant for the speaker. But there is another, very disturbing side. With the development of communications, the number of living languages decreases with an average speed of one language every two weeks. In this context, the preservation of linguistic diversity comes across as an important matter, since it reflects historical experience, contains instruments of socialization, expression and transmission of social and cultural traditions. Languages contribute to the increase of human knowledge, because they are the richest and most diverse products of a creative mind, in addition, languages serve as a means of self-identification, they enforce it and are of great value to people who speak them.

June 6 is a special date for the Russian world. This is the birthday of the Great Russian poet and prose writer Alexander Pushkin. For us, he is not only the great genius of belles-lettres, but also the creator of modern Russian literature. It is noteworthy that his ancestors came out of Africa, and the life of the Pushkin family is a vivid example of a cultural and linguistic bridge between different peoples.

The history of Russia is the destiny of not only the Russian people, but it is the Russian language that has united the peoples of Russia for centuries. It grew stronger and developed with them. It helped develop the languages and cultures of other peoples, both living in our country and abroad. It has long ceased to belong only to Russians. Many generations were brought up, grew up and matured on it. He united us all into one family of the Russian world and Russian culture.

Our language is extremely flexible and can absorb and embed foreign words in its fabric. Modern theater and cinema, the scientific field, as well as literary, office and youth language are vivid confirmation of this. Moreover, the basis of the language, its general semantics are unshakable, and its preservation guarantees the integrity of national culture, spirituality, morality and unity.

Russian is one of the six official languages of the UN. The year 2020 is marked by interconnected anniversaries of the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II and the foundation of the UN. 75 years ago, the conditions were created for the formation of a post-war world order, the UN being the supporting structure for it - the cornerstone of the system of international relations and multilateralism. We believe that the preservation of linguistic diversity and multilingualism, as well as linguistic parity as the main principles of the UN's work, is our priority, which we invariably uphold.

Congratulations to all on the UN Russian Language Day!

Learn Russian and speak Russian!