"Man fights to spell his name in Russian"

The idea of having "basic human rights" sometimes gets dramatized into issues, real issues of course, but we’re used to reading about people being beaten, or harassed, or not being treated with basic decency. However, what if your homeland was telling you that you had to change your birth name? Maybe it is less offensive than the above mentioned, but Ruslan Pankratov is taking his case to court. It's seems odd, but apparently countries such as Latvia do require that names correspond with their grammar rules. According to “Russia today,“ native Russian Ruslan Pankratov moved to Latvia and was told that the spelling of his name did not correspond to their grammar rules, and in order to accommodate this issue, they are going to legally add an “s” to the end of his name. Clearly, this idea does not appease Ruslan Pankratov and he would prefer to go by the name that he was given at birth, and has gone by his entire life. He took his case to the European court of Human Rights with an argument that outlined similar issues in other countries- however, other countries do not require that a name by completely changed. He argues that if other countries were ran like Latvia, think of how many people would have to forfeit their given name, as languages obviously differ from place to place. There is no say as to how the trial is progressing, but it certainly seems as if Ruslan Pankratov has a legitimate case. Human rights can be a tricky topic since it can cover all manners of sin in the case of humans interacting, and governments interacting with humans. However, a birth name seems so sacred that it’s hard to imagine that right being withheld from someone because of a difference in grammar.

http://www.russiatoday.ru/news/news/13306