The country celebrates Russia Day

The country celebrates the national holiday - Russia Day or Independence Day as it was called before 2002. It has been celebrated annually beginning from 1992. On June 12, 1990 the First congress of the People’s deputies of RSFSR adopted the ‘Declaration on the national sovereignty of RSFSR’. The day of June 12 became a holiday from 1992 under the order of the Supreme Council of the Russian Federation as the ‘Day of adoption of the declaration on the national sovereignty of Russia’. In autumn of the same year the amendments to the Code of laws on labor which defined this day as the holiday were introduced. On June 12, 1998 during his address on the television Boris Yeltsin suggested to rename the holiday into ‘Russia Day’. Officially this name was conferred with the adoption of a new Labor Code in 2002.