All Russian museums to become free for kids

All Russian museums will become free for children under sixteen years of age in the near future, Minister of Culture Vladimir Medinsky said at a conference on culture and the arts at the presidential office on Friday.

"For the first time ever we held an experiment. All federal museums in half of Russia’s territories were open to youngsters under sixteen for free. We devised a way of compensating for the museums' costs. We do hope that all children in our country will soon be able to go to all museums across the nation free of charge," Medinsky said, according to the news agency Tass.

In the outgoing year the total visits to museums grew by 14% and museum’s extra-budgetary incomes were up by 30%.