You're reading: Ukraine activists rally over Russia language bill

Around a thousand opposition activists are rallying outside Ukraine's presidential office to protest a bill upgrading the status of the Russian language.

The Ukrainian parliament passed a bill Wednesday which would allow the use of Russian in courts, education and other government institutions in Russian-speaking regions. Ukraine’s pro-Western opposition says such a law would effectively smother the Ukrainian language by removing any incentive for millions of Russian-speaking Ukrainians to learn and speak it.

The activists — mostly students, dressed in traditional embroidered shirts — gathered Thursday outside the president’s office in the capital, Kiev. Some of them waved national flags and chanted “East and West together!” and “No to the split of Ukraine!”

The controversial bill has yet to be signed by the president to become law.