"I think that in the current situation — no. The ruling authorities exert great resistance," Boyko told RIA Novosti, responding to a question about the prospects for the Russian language to be granted official status in a new Ukrainian constitution.
Constitutional reform in Ukraine with focus on decentralizing power is part of the 13-point Minsk Deal, finalized in mid-February by the leaders of Russia, Ukraine, Germany and France in Minsk, the capital of Belarus. According to the Minsk deal, the reforms are to be implemented by the end of 2015.
However, on April 6, when the Ukrainian constitutional commission first convened, the country's president, Petro Poroshenko, said that Ukrainian will remain the only state language in Ukraine.
According to the Ukrainian Census, 29.6 percent of Ukrainians considered Russian to be their native language. This was especially true for Ukraine's eastern regions of Donetsk and Lugansk, where some 70 percent of local residents indicated the same.
