This seems reminiscent to me of the attempts in the US to have English declared the official national language. I respect the worth of an effort to educate newcomers, and people who may have been present for a while but somehow insulated, in local culture, but whether or not it is worth it for the state to do this in a way that, though not legally binding, is official may offend people and create tensions and therefore be a net negative development. I'm not sure of that, I don't have a firm opinion on this, but those are the dynamics I see as being important. Furthermore of course, there is politics involved in this. As foreign cultures are seen as encroaching on longstanding local and national culture, the natives, who make up the majority, feel threatened and want the government to do something about it, and the government responds to curry favor with the people. At any rate, what Moscow would be doing with this code is moderate in comparison to coercive measures being advanced in some European states, such as France with the burkas.

@American, If anyone is to tackle the issue – Americans are; the unprecedented experience of melting pot in human history deserves serious reviewing. Very privately, having family in USA and visiting USA quite often – I got the impression that multi-lingual America is loosing her track of identity. Moreover it would inevitably happen to anybody. The main problem is in a way bipolar. Sides, natives and foreign minorities should exercise convergence instead of fixed solutions. That means the natives are having huge relative advantage speaking-and-thinking easily on the mother tongue. If the convergence is to expect in future, the natives should learn one foreign language, say English as the one, which meets the common technological future. The foreigners should reduce the social tension (by the fact they remain not understandable) – and learn English as well. We end that – learning is our common future, but the load is better dynamically shared. The fact is that two people who speak broken English understand each other better with fewer words, then the native and foreigner speaking broken native tongue. Or finally – two broken tongues are better solution, than only one facing perfect native superiority.

Good. After Moscow authorities have prepared their code of acceptable conduct for non-Russians in Moscow, perhaps Estonia can commission them to also prepare a code of acceptable behaviour by non-Estonian Russians in Tallinn.

Don't worry, they already know how to deal with Estonian Nazis, they had to sort them out once, I am sure they know how to do it again, for the benefit of Europe!

If nothing dramatically changes in the future – the world is going toward pretty wild mixture of different nations and cultures with loose boundaries between countries. My personal experience with mult-cultural/national environment – it is great and I like it. The problem which it may bring to locals – it creates more dynamic and competitive environment. To survive in such world -- constant update of the existing knowledge and skills is required. For that matter, the environment dictates what you need – what skills, what language. May be English, may be Chinese. For example, if you are doing business in Mexico you do not need English (this is your obligation, though, to know Spanish before you go there). So, I, personally, see the future generations as speaking multiple languages and being multi-skilled. The behavior will be determined by where and with whom you are. Shortly – the world, as I see it, will be revolved around particular groups of people rather than countries. And such groups would dictate the rules of behavior, not countries. This way, Moscow, may just artificially delays something inevitable. Which will take useless effort and taxpayers money to maintain such policy. And this is not quite obvious to me that the city would benefit from this. By the way, I personally, like when I see somebody speaking Spanish, Chinese, German, or Hindu. And I like when people feel free in their choices. For that matter, if Moscow would have strict policy to suppress national diversity, I would, definitely, never live in such city.

The jungle is the ultimate freedom, you can do what you like, you just need to keep your wits about you, develop yourself, and your survival instincts will take you as far as your ability can, or until a more able soul kills you off. Such perfect freedom, what an end to aspire to. The jungle, the ultimate goal of humanity? Didn't we try that one? Didn't we work it out, that you had to give up some freedoms, a social contract, so that we lived in a less day to day survival mode, a tribal unstable life. It's a lovely pleasureable experience to have muticulturism, and absolutely it should be encouraged, it supports diversity and is beneficial, but you can't have it, without some governance, some framewaork, that actually provides the environment for it to flourish, and what better than a voluntary code, which if made light hearted, would be even better. The problem is that people can see extremes, the jungle or a utopia of self personally regulated muticultural heaven. The truth is that we need something in between, many languages, muti cultural diversity with some framework of controls, otherwsie we wind up with an unregulated model, something like we have with the world markets now, together with the real resultant brutality that inevitably comes with it in the end. Where to set the bar, who knows, but the best method, must be through fostering tolerance and having public debate. Indeed this process is itself part of generating the environment for true multiculturism. Abdicated responsibility, or just let it flow, will do that, let it flow to the jungle, with all its tribalism and inherent brutality. Its good to talk, in any language, it's also good to have tolerance and also have the very reservoirs and cultural critical masses, that support the very foundations of worlwide muticulturism. Without all these, entropy just takes over. Welcome back to the jungle - future or past!