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Kremlin Approves Anthem Lyrics
The poet whose pro-Stalinist stanzas graced the former USSR anthem has written a new version which has been approved by a Kremlin advisory panel.
Sergei Mikhalkov's lyrics are to go with the music of the old Soviet anthem, which Russia this week reinstated as its national hymn, officials said on Wednesday.
The words of the 87-year-old poet, who co-authored the original lyrics, praising Soviet founder Lenin, and the Communist Party, as well as Stalin, have yet to be released.
But Russia's NTV quoted sources on the panel as saying that one well-known line from the old anthem had been retained: "Sing to the Motherland, home of the free."
The Soviet anthem went on to describe the motherland as a "bulwark of people in brotherhood strong." The new version would instead have an "age-long union of brotherly peoples," NTV reported.
Mikhalkov, is a popular author of children's nursery rhymes whose original 1943 verse "Unbreakable union of free republics" was ditched a decade ago when the Soviet Union broke up.
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