ABSTRACT
Between 1926 and 1939, the number of Russians living outside of the Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic rose from 5.1 million to 9.3 million, almost a doubling in thirteen years. Moldova is one of very few former Soviet republics where Russians do not constitute the largest ethnic minority. In many parts of the former Soviet Union, the majority of the Ukrainians are so linguistically and culturally Russified that it would make little sense to treat them as a separate category. All over the former Soviet Union, language disputes have been in the forefront of the ethnic controversies. In the constitutions and language laws of a few countries—Kazakhstan, Moldova, and Ukraine—Russian has been granted official status as the language of interethnic communication. In the new states in Eurasia, with two exceptions, the Russians and all other ethnic minorities have been granted automatic citizenship rights. Political leaders in Russia are often accused of exploiting the Russian diaspora issue for ulterior purposes.
