And Moscow still doesn't understand why East and Central Europe sought freedom after 1990?
To be free of Russian racism.
"You come here, to our country, and start talking on the phone in some language. Why do we have to listen to it?"
In Moscow, a xenophobic Russian woman began insulting a Buryat woman because she was speaking her native language on the phone while on a bus. Later, another Russian woman hit her in the face.
To give you an idea, Buryatia leads all Russian regions by a wide margin in terms of the number of mobilized soldiers killed per capita (as of July 2025, the ratio is 1:19). Buryats account for more than 8% of the mobilized soldiers killed, even though they make up only 3% of the population according to the census.
As of now, independent journalists have identified more than 4,500 obituaries of Buryat residents killed in Ukraine, though the actual number may be much higher.