MOSCOW, October 10, 2007 Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VCIOM) presents information concerning how Russians evaluate our people's tolerance and peacekeeping capacity, in what situations they most often encounter discrimination between nationalities, where they see a menace to international peace and the ways to preserve it.

The Russian people can be characterized by openness, striving for communication and interaction with representatives of different peoples, religions and cultures, as the majority of respondents assume (87%). 87% of Russian people adhere to this point of view (86% of respondents identify themselves as Russians by nationality) and even a higher proportion of representatives of other nationalities, 91%. Only 8% of respondents do not quite agree with the assertion.

The Russian people has unified different peoples in the course of its history and reconciled them with each other, as 80% of respondents identify. No more than 10% of respondents agree with the opposite point of view, that the history of Russian state is a history of forced annexation of other peoples and countries as well as suppression of their national identity and independence.

Mutual relations between different peoples of our country have always been tolerant, as 78% of respondents indicate (11% disagree with them). The government has always based its policy on the equality of rights of different peoples living in our country, 71% of respondents think (16% do not share their opinion). Opinions of Russians and representatives of other nationalities on this issue are practically equally distributed.

If we speak about personal experience, only 4% of respondents frequently encounter discrimination between nationalities, another 14% see it sometimes. This most frequently happens in private life, i.e. in stores, hotels, public transport, etc. (4% of respondents mention that this frequently happens to them or to their nearest relations, and 14% identify that it happens to them sometimes), when being hired (2% and 11%) or when applying for a place at a university (1% and 7%).

More than half of Russians (59%) would tolerate if they or their children would contract a marriage with a representative of some other nationality (this includes 18% who would definitely tolerate it, and 41% who would rather tolerate it). This possibility seems tolerable to 57% of Russians, whereas 75% of the representatives of other nationalities find it admittable.

The President of our country must only be Russian by nationality, as 54% of Russian respondents think, and 23% assume that this can be a person of some other nationality. 58% among representatives of other nationalities have nothing against the President being of a nationality different from the one they belong to.

The majority of Russians communicate with representatives of other nationalities. 69% have colleagues, good acquaintances like that, whereas 68% have friends of other nationalities. Respondents most often do not have any blood relation with a nationality other than their own: 60% do not have it among their close relatives, and 49% have none among the distant ones either; whereas 49% do not have them among their ill-willers.

The initiative all-Russia opinion poll was conducted by VCIOM on August 25-26, 2007. 1562 respondents were interviewed in 153 population areas of 46 regions of Russia. The statistical error does not exceed 3.4%.