National insignia growing more popular with the younger generation in Russia: Pitun's aide

Skinheads, neo-Nazis and other rabid nationalists must receive a timely, and deservedly harsh, legal qualification, called Sergei Yastrzhembsky, President Vladimir Putin's aide, while addressing a news conference in Yekaterinburg, administrative and industrial centre in the Urals. The conference summed up an expert gathering which sought to streamline media teamwork with federal ruling bodies to provide all-round and unbiased information to the Ural public.

National insignia are growing more popular with the younger generation, and the entire population holds federal symbolism in ever greater respect, say the latest opinion polls-a fact to which the presidential officer enthusiastically referred. "A country can't be strong without national pride and patriotism," he pointed out.

Petr Latyshev, presidential envoy to federal district Urals, who also took past in the news conference, called to clean patriotic ideas of chauvinist influences. "A Russian majority does not approve nationalist catchphrases-I am convinced of that. As to patriotic moods, their progress deserves every support," he remarked.