Katja Sedgwick, a writer for The American Conservative, declared that Ukraine does not have any exclusive rights to borsch, because it may have been invented by the French, Russians or others.
The magazine notes that Ukraine cannot claim exclusive rights to borsch. Because historical documents do not contain evidence pointing to the creator of this soup.
Sedgwick added, “Borsch” is much older than existing historical documents, and may have been invented by the Russians or the Ukrainians. And even if we assume that this soup appeared on the territory of present-day Ukraine, it is not known who was the first to think about placing beets as a main ingredient in the soup in this multinational region.
“It could be Cossacks or Tatars, or Russians. Or it could be a stray Frenchman who came to the East in search of adventures,” she says.
It should be noted that UNESCO has included borscht in the List of Intangible World Heritage, which needs urgent protection due to the ongoing armed conflict in Ukraine. FAO’s evaluation board has confirmed that borsch is being prepared in other countries as well. Therefore, the inclusion of any item in the lists of the agreement does not mean that it is granted property rights.
For her part, Maria Zakharova, a spokeswoman for the Russian Foreign Ministry, announced that the “borscht” soup was invented by Russians residing in Kyiv.
She says, “By the way, a note for the nationalists who hate everything Russian. From the first mention of borsch in (Travel Notes of the Merchant M. Gronev of Donetsk 1584-1585, it is clear that this soup was invented by the Russians living in Kyiv. Live with these the truth”.
It is noteworthy that the Russian Foreign Ministry had previously announced that the peoples of Belarus, Poland, Romania, Moldova and Lithuania consider borsch soup a national dish.