Russian Couples who “Live Together Outside of Marriage Threaten Country’s National Security,’ Deputy Justice Minister Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 24 – Apparently because couples who live together without getting married have fewer children than those who do tie the knot, Vadim Balanin, the deputy justice minister says that those who live together but don’t get married “threaten Russia’s national security” as do those who marry and then divorce.

            The deputy minister made those remarks at the St. Petersburg International Legal Forum and suggested that the government must do more to limit cohabitation and promote marriage as part of Putin’s much-ballyhooed program of supporting traditional values against the nefarious influence of the West (rbc.ru/society/24/06/2026/6a3b8e149a7947a63e54e6a4).

            Belanin’s suggestion has attracted much criticism, including by a Moskovsky Komsomolets journalist who says that the deputy minister fails to recognize that those who live together without formal marriage nonetheless produce 23 percent of all Russian children (mk.ru/editions/daily/2026/06/24/sovokupivshikhsya-posredstvom-bluda-luchshe-razluchat-kak-vlast-budet-borotsya-s-vnebrachnymi-svyazyami.html).

            Those who live by themselves rather than cohabiting produce far fewer and so, according to the journalist, the government should be supporting cohabitation as better than single life styles as it is giving the Kremlin some if not all of what it wants. Belanin’s failure to talk about that raises questions about what he wants to do.

            The deputy justice minister says his agency is monitoring closely changes in the family code to try to address the situation, but unless he is prepared to take really draconian and deeply unpopular steps such as compelling people to marry, he is unlikely to achieve the demographic outcomes he hopes for.

            The journalist then suggests that what Belanin is really interested in is a Russia where everyone follows the same path and subordinates himself or herself to what the Kremlin prefers, the West will exploit that – and the risk that it will do so is the real threat to Russian national security that the deputy minister is so concerned about.