NICOSIA, 16 September. /TASS/. The opening of the new academic year took place as part of an Open Day at the Russian Centre of Science and Culture (RCSC) in Nicosia. This is reported by a TASS correspondent.
The centre presented new programmes of its educational courses, including Russian as a native language and as a foreign language, as well as Greek and English. Among the RCSC’s other courses and studios are music and speech-therapy departments, vocal ensembles — including the choirs Al’Singers, InChoRus and “Biryuza”, which have gained popularity in Cyprus — and a newly opened ballet studio taught by an experienced choreographer.
During the evening, other educational centres in Cyprus also presented their work, including those from Paphos, Limassol and Nicosia. Among them are the Educational and Methodological Centre “Pioneer”, which offers the opportunity to study under the Russian curriculum and take assessments without relocating, including the GIA and the Unified State Exam (EGE), as well as to obtain a state-standard certificate; the Russian-language general education school “Morphosis” with in-depth study of English and Greek, which operates according to the curricula of the ministries of education of both the Russian Federation and the Republic of Cyprus; the mathematics school “Fractal”; the children’s development centre BeSmart; and others.
Russian ambassador on the Russian language
The Russian Embassy in Nicosia actively supports the educational and cultural programmes of the RCSC and other educational centres in Cyprus. “We are pleased to see how many Cypriots and representatives of other communities living on the island enthusiastically engage with the history and culture of the Russian Federation in universities, schools, training centres and other educational institutions, and how the Russian language is increasingly becoming a means of interethnic communication on the island and a focus of many forums, festivals and school olympiads. There are solid grounds for this: the diaspora of Russian compatriots in Cyprus has already exceeded 150,000 people, and in addition many tens of thousands of people from other post-Soviet countries live on the island and are used to communicating with one another in Russian. It should also be noted that Cypriots place a very high value on the education they received in our country, and therefore Russian is spoken fluently by Cypriots who graduated from Soviet and Russian universities and who have formed their own association on the island, which traditionally takes an active part in many public events, including large-scale Victory Day celebrations in Cyprus,” Russian Ambassador to Nicosia Murat Zyazikov told a TASS correspondent.
He stressed that the Russian diplomatic mission in Nicosia “in every way encourages efforts aimed at further strengthening the position of the Russian language on the island and at promoting Russian culture and the traditional values shared by the overwhelming majority of people in Russia and Cyprus.”
The head of the Russian diplomatic mission added that native speakers of Russian make up a considerable part of Cyprus’s business community, which increases demand for media published in their native language. “There are dozens of Russian-language media outlets in Cyprus — newspapers, magazines, radio, a developed network of online publications, Telegram channels, thematic chats and other sources of information — and it is already impossible to imagine today’s Cypriot media landscape without them. Setting out the foundations of state language policy, our national leader, President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, emphasised that the Russian language is not only a national treasure of the Russian Federation but also an important element of world culture. We are glad to note that the strengthening of the Russian language’s position in Cyprus and the steady growth in the number of people wishing to learn it fully confirm the correctness and fairness of that statement,” Murat Zyazikov said.
@rusembcy
