MOSCOW, September 6 (RIA Novosti) - Banning the Russian language for Ukrainian legal procedures infringes upon the rights of almost 20 million Russian speakers living in Ukraine, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement published on its official Web site.

"We believe the change of Ukrainian legal procedure to the state language exclusively infringes on the rights of almost 20 million Russian-language Ukrainian citizens, comprising 40% of the country's population. This deprives them of adequate judicial protection," the statement said.

The ministry said legal terms in a foreign language were hard to understand but critical to citizens involved in legal issues.

"This decision is seen as one continuing in the vein of an unfair campaign surrounding the Russian language in Ukraine, which was recently demonstrated by Ukrainian authorities in the Komsomolskoye village in the Simferopol region in regard to Russian-language school No.43," the statement said. At the prestigious school where children are taught in Russian, admissions applications written by parents in Russian were not accepted.

The ministry said it hoped Ukraine would consider Russian concerns in line with article 10 of its constitution that guarantees the protection of minority languages.