This is has been discussed for a long time. You can check the "europe" file, which Paul said; # From Paul Eggert (2018-10-03):
# As is usual in tzdb, Ukrainian zones use the most common English spellings. # For example, tzdb uses Europe/Kiev, as "Kiev" is the most common spelling in # English for Ukraine's capital, even though it is certainly wrong as a # transliteration of the Ukrainian "Київ". This is similar to tzdb's use of # Europe/Prague, which is certainly wrong as a transliteration of the Czech # "Praha". ("Kiev" came from old Slavic via Russian to English, and "Prague" # came from old Slavic via French to English, so the two cases have something # in common.)
*Admittedly English-language spelling of Ukrainian names is# controversial, and some day "Kyiv" may become substantially morepopular in# English; in the meantime, stick with the traditional English "Kiev" asthat# means less disruption for our users. * *# controversial, and some day "Kyiv" may become substantially more* *popular in* *# English; in the meantime, stick with the traditional English "Kiev" as* *that**# means less disruption for our users. *
On Sat, Oct 26, 2019 at 3:47 AM Chris Woodbury via tz <tz@iana.org> wrote:
i can't help but notice, with Ukraine dominating the news, that *every single* reference that I've seen (US State Dept, MSNBC, CNN, ABC News, NBC News, CBS News, every graphic, etc, with the capitol mentioned) has spelled it Kyiv.
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