MARIUPOL, Ukraine — Galyna Lekunova, a veterinarian in the eastern Ukrainian city of Mariupol, was left fuming by a new law in January mandating the use of Ukrainian in the service industry.
In protest against the regulations that she said amounted to “discrimination,” the 47-year-old began offering 50-percent discounts to her Russian-speaking clients.
This is what she believes spurred the perpetrators of a graffiti attack on her clinic, which was defaced in late January with scrawls of black coffins and a warning of “Death to the enemies”.
One month later, the paint was still visible on a poster of a puppy advertising her services in Russian in the industrial port city on…
Keep on reading: New law stokes Ukraine language tensions