Russia, September 13: This past week, Russia’s education ministry announced that the country’s high schools will now require students to read excerpts from Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago. Perhaps more than any other work, this formerly-banned book exposed the extent and horrors of Soviet oppression. NPR’s correspondent in Moscow Anne Garrels says the education ministry’s announcement should not be taken as a sign that Russian leaders are now prepared to fully and honestly confront the Stalinist past. The announcement comes amid a stream of pronouncements from the Kremlin about Russia’s historic role and rightful place on the world stage.
—Agencies