On Radio Ekho Moskvy tonight, Anatoliy Lysenko, the father of modern Russian TV, president of the International Academy of TV and radio, was asked a question about the situation in Ukraine (not just because it's relevant but also because he was born somewhere near Vinnytsya). His voice seemed to grow sadder - he's one of those people who seriously believe in the possibility of Ukraine splitting into two.

Yanukovych, he said, was addressing the crowd in Russian, and Yushchenko - in Ukrainian.

This seemed to be the main basis for Lysenko's fear (he also worried we might have a re-run of 1993 in Moscow).

The way they are completely missing the point about the "language issue" is amazing: it's as if one half of the country speaks Hebrew and the other Chinese.

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Surprisingly, Victor Chernomyrdin, the Russian ambassador in Ukraine, sounds a lot more reasonable (Gazeta.ru, RUS): he doesn't think it's gonna get as violent here as it did in Yugoslavia - and he insists that Russia doesn't favor Yanukovych any more than anyone else.