Poroshenko Urges WEF To Fix Mistake On Princess Olga Of Kiev Named Modern Russia's Founder

KIEV (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 11th March, 2021) Former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko on Thursday said that the World Economic Forum (WEF) mistakenly named Princess Olga of Kiev as a founder of modern Russia and urged the forum to correct the error.

On International Women's Day earlier this week, the WEF published a list of six women who changed the history of the world, which included Princess Olga, among others. According to the ex-Ukrainian leader, the princess cannot be called a Russian ruler and founder of modern Russia, as it was written on the WEF website, because she ruled Kievan Rus, an ancient state that existed on the territory of modern Ukraine, Belarus and Russia. The politician added that Princess Olga could not be considered an ancestor of the Russian Federation, as the Moscow Principality was founded only more than 300 years after she passed away

"I ask the team of World Economic Forum @wef to correct the mistakes in the description of one of the most famous women in Ukrainian history without delay and check its sources more closely," Poroshenko wrote on Twitter.

The forum has already removed the reference to Princess Olga "due to conflicting historical accounts." But according to the initial version of the list published on the WEF website, Kievan Rus was indicated as the "progenitor of modern Russia," and did not refer to Olga as the "founder."

Olga of Kiev, the first recorded female ruler of Kievan Rus, ascended the throne after the assassination of her husband, Prince Igor of Kiev, in 945. She adopted Christianity while most of the people in her entourage remained pagan and was canonized as the first Russian saint of the Orthodox Church. She is considered to be one of the most prominent rulers, as she carried out the first-ever state reform and established strong diplomatic ties with Western Europe.