The Russia Journal

How many foreign students are there in Moscow and how many foreign non-permanent residents? What nationalities are common among them? – Rajiv Thind, Jalandhar City, India.

There are 16,000 foreign students in Moscow and surprisingly, St. Petersburg has overtaken Moscow in this respect. Among the foreign students there are Chinese, Indians, Moroccans, Palestinians, Sri Lankans, Vietnamese and North Africans. In Russia as a whole, there are 66,000 foreign students. Half of them are here for the duration of their studies. The rest are on probation, for short terms. Ten percent have their tuition paid for by the government, while the rest pay themselves.

Today there are 400,000 unregistered foreigners living in Russia. The Vietnamese diaspora is the largest. At our markets, you can hear Korean, Turkish, Hindi and Chinese being spoken.

What is the National Anthem of Russia, and who wrote it? – Pankaj Hajra, Burdwan, West Bengal, India.

Before World War II, today's National Anthem was the anthem of the Bolshevik Party. At the beginning of the war, it became the anthem of the Soviet Union. Today, the same melody is used in the Russian National Anthem. When you hear it, the old words come to mind. Many don't approve of it, and neither do I. I believe it was a step by President Putin to please the left wing. I have a feeling that, with time, it will be changed. The associations with the communist past are too great. The composer was the leader of the Red Army Song and Dance Group, Alexandrov.

Wouldn't greater Russian involvement in Afghanistan recently have been in the interests of peace? – Gerald Meiers, Fargo, North Dakota, U.S.

Our top officials have time and again stated that we will not send armed forces into Afghanistan. We gave all the other assistance possible. I think the reason for this is that we consider our entry into Afghanistan, where we stayed for 10 years, a political mistake. Most probably many of the Afghans were not too happy, and we did not want to bring back old memories. I remember someone saying, "Would the Vietnamese be happy to see the U.S. Army again?" There may be a similarity. But we did give the Northern Alliance arms and we provided the United States with our airspace and the airfields of our Central Asian allies. We also gave humanitarian aid and opened a bridge across a river into Afghanistan. We believe the United States should be very careful in choosing its next target, if it does choose one. It may give rise to something none of us want.

(E-mail Joe at editor@russiajournal.com.)