The Kyiv Post reported on Tuesday August 31^st 2010, on the results of a survey carried out by sociologists from the Levada-Center, a Russian public opinion and market research company, about Russian views of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact.

The poll, conducted in Russia between August 20^th and August 23^rd, revealed surprising statistics about Russian views of the pact of non-aggression between Nazi Germany and the USSR signed in Moscow on August 23^rd, 1939. Many Russians are unaware of the pact’s existence and the majority (56%) of those questioned were unaware that Soviet troops invaded Poland alongside the Germans in September 1939. 

A similar survey was conducted in Russia in 2005. The recent poll has revealed, however, that the percentage of Russians approving of the signature of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact has declined from 40% to 33% over the past five years. 46% of respondents were unaware of the pact's existence (37% in 2005) and the document is condemned by 5% of Russians. 

The number of respondents who believe that the secret protocol to the pact about the territorial partition of Northern and Eastern Europe into spheres of German and Soviet influence really existed has also declined since 2005. In 2005, 43% of those surveyed believed that the secret protocol really existed, against 36% in 2010. 41% of respondents said they had never even heard of the protocols. 

Respondents were also asked about the extent to which different views of the events of 1939-40 in Russia and Poland and the Baltic states affected the country's relations with its neighbours. On this point, Russian views diverge: 31% believe that the relations between the countries are not compounded by different interpretations of the events at the beginning of the Second World War; 29% believe that historical memories can have an impact on relations between countries. 40% could not answer.