A General Meeting of Founders of the Coordination Center for TLD .RU/.РФ took place, where a decision was made to add the letter “ӕ” from the Ossetian alphabet to the list of characters allowed in .РФ domain names. This change followed an appeal by the Digital Development Committee of the Republic of North Ossetia–Alania, which requested that the list of permissible characters for .РФ domain name registration be expanded.
The appeal states that a key task of the government authorities of the Republic of North Ossetia–Alania is to implement measures aimed at preserving and developing the Ossetian language, which, along with Russian, is an official language of the Republic. Ossetian is also among those supported by Yandex.Translate.
The modern Ossetian alphabet is based on the Cyrillic script, with the only non-Cyrillic letter being “ӕ.”
“This letter has become a symbol of Ossetian identity, used in souvenirs, signage, and even as an art motif. Adding this single character will allow for making full use of the Ossetian language in website names,” the statement emphasizes.
“One of the Coordination Center’s key goals is to support the principles of multilingualism and linguistic diversity on the Russian Internet. This decision will contribute to the preservation, support, and development of the national languages of Russia’s peoples, particularly the Ossetian language. We will continue our efforts to expand the list of Cyrillic characters so that .РФ domain names can be registered in all state – and eventually official – languages of Russia’s peoples,” said Andrey Vorobyev, Director of the Coordination Center for TLD .RU/.РФ.
On July 2, 2025, by decision of the General Meeting of Founders, the Rules for Domain Name Registration in the .RU and .РФ TLDs were updated by adding the Appendix List of Characters Permitted in Domain Names in the .РФ. The new edition of the Rules entered into force on August 11, 2025. Starting from that date, registration of internet addresses using characters from the 17 official languages of Russia’s republics became available in the country-code Cyrillic domain, .РФ. Now, one more character and one more official language, Ossetian, will be added to this list. The new version of the Rules will take effect in December 2025.
The participants of the General Meeting of Founders also approved amendments to the Accreditation Agreement and addressed several other organizational and financial matters.
