Putin bans Russian officials from using foreign words in swipe at ‘degenerate’ West

Government officials in Russia will be banned from using most foreign words while carrying out their duties under plans drawn up by Vladimir Putin, who has railed against the corrupting influence of the “degenerate” West.

The president has amended a 2005 law designed to protect and support the status of the Russian language, preventing public workers from using words and expressions “that do not correspondent to norms of modern Russia.”

There will exceptions for foreign words that “do not have widely-used corresponding equivalents in Russian," according to the announcement on the government’s website.

The amendement is “aimed at protecting the Russian language from the excessive use of foreign words,” it says.

Since invading Ukraine a year ago, Mr Putin has said he wants to protect Russia from what he calls a “degenerate” West that he alleges is trying to destroy his country.

In a state of the nation address last week, he blamed the West for starting the war and claimed that Russia responded with force “in order to stop it”.

Mr Putin claimed Ukraine “has become hostage of the Kyiv regime and its Western masters, which have effectively occupied the country”.

He risked further inflaming tensions with the West by suspending participation in the last remaining nuclear arms control pact with the US.

The UK’s ambassador in Kyiv, Dame Melinda Simmons, said: “Nobody is responsible for the Russian invasion of Ukraine but Russia.”

Russian forces on Wednesday morning carried out relentless attacks on the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut in their quest for a breakthrough in the year-long war, although one US official predicted few short-term territorial gains for Russia.

Bakhmut had a population of about 70,000 before the war but has been ruined during months of fighting as a focal point of Russian assaults and determined Ukrainian defence.

"The enemy continues to advance in the direction of Bakhmut. He does not stop storming the city of Bakhmut," the Ukrainian military said in a morning briefing.

A Russian takeover of the small mining city would open the way to seizing the last remaining urban centres in the industrial Donetsk province.

President Volodymyr Zelensky, in a video address late on Tuesday, said the battle for Bakhmut was "most difficult" but its defence was essential.

"Russia in general takes no account of people and sends them in constant waves against our positions, the intensity of the fighting is only increasing,"  Mr Zelensky said.