MOSCOW, August 7. /TASS/. Vladimir Zelensky, his entourage, and most of the ministers and deputies of the Servants of the People ruling party speak Russian when they are not on camera, while ordinary Ukrainians are fined for speaking it, said Verkhovna Rada Deputy Alexey Goncharenko (on Russian list of terrorists and extremists).

He referred to an incident with the coach of a youth football team, who was fined for speaking Russian during a club practice.

"Vladimir Zelensky communicates in his office in Russian, most ministers communicate in Russian, most of the Servants of the People communicates in Russian. Is that okay? There are no fines. But the football coach has to pay," Goncharenko said on Telegram.

The Ukrainian government is openly trying to extinguish the Russian language. The country has a law "On Ensuring the Functioning of the Ukrainian Language as the State Language," which significantly limits the use of Russian and the languages of national minorities. For instance, it prohibits teaching in Russian, and the authorities insist that even during breaks in school children should communicate in Ukrainian. The language ombudsman regularly reports on fines and even the dismissal of teachers who conduct lessons in Russian.

At the same time, it has become apparent that officials talk among themselves in Russian. For example, when last November the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) launched a large-scale operation called "Midas" to uncover a major corruption scheme, it published audio recordings in which the participants in the scheme -- many of whom were people from Zelensky’s inner circle -- discussed their plans in Russian.

Similarly, former prime minister and leader of the opposition Batkivshchina party Yulia Timoshenko, who positions herself as a defender of the Ukrainian language and always uses it publicly in her speeches, was noticed using Russian. Timoshenko became involved in the case of attempted bribery of deputies. In the recordings published by the investigation, she also talks with other parliamentarians in Russian, and they respond in the same language.