"The task is to make it look as if Ukraine does not exist." Mediazona: "Prosveshchenie" employees asked to remove "incorrect" references to the country from school textbooks

After the war in Ukraine began, the management of the Prosveshcheniye publishing house issued an unofficial order to minimize references to Ukraine and Kiev in Russian school textbooks. Three editors of the publishing house told Mediazona about this.

This order was received on the first day of the war, February 24. The management's request to remove "incorrect" references to Ukraine was conveyed to the employees of "Prosveshchenie" at a "confidential" meeting, the publication's sources said.

According to them, they began to "cleanse" Ukraine from school textbooks after 2014, trying to mention the country as rarely and carefully as possible. Now editors must remove references to the state wherever possible. After February 24, they had to "scratch out about 15% of the texts," Mediazona learned.

"That is, we are faced with the task of making it as if Ukraine simply does not exist. It is much worse when a textbook simply does not mention a certain country. A person grows up without a knowledge base about a certain country, and then it is much easier for him to believe what he is told about it on TV," said the employee of "Prosveshchenie".

One of Mediazona's interlocutors noted that context is important when editing textbooks in this way: "We can mention how we saved Kyiv, but we can no longer talk about any kind of independence of Ukraine as a country." For example, according to him, history textbooks can mention once that Kievan Rus was formed, but then simply call it Rus.

In addition, as Mediazona has learned, sometimes editors can come up with their own wording for mentioning Ukraine, but often management simply sends them ready-made paragraphs, which they correct.

The publishing house was unable to promptly comment on the information about the instructions regarding the words “Ukraine” and “Kyiv” in textbooks.