Skip Nav  Russia Has Highest Divorce Rate in World  One Reason
Divorce Rates Are So High in Russia  When the United Nations
released its annual Demographic Yearbook, a collection of global
population stats, earlier this week, Russia was crowned the
divorce capital of the world. In fact, if you look at the top
nine countries for divorce, it becomes clear splitting up is
very popular in Eastern Europe: Belarus, Ukraine, Moldova, and
Lithuania all make the top nine. Could Eastern Europe be to the
world what Reno, NV, was to the US in the midcentury — a place
with slapdash laws and waits so short people make vacations out
of it?  Not really. While Russia doesn't have particularly
strict divorce laws, it doesn't exactly encourage it either.
It's not so different than the United States (ranked No. 6),
since both consider the vague "irreconcilable differences"
catchall a valid reason.  What may be boosting the rate is the
region's communist history and current attitude. They were all
part of the Soviet Union, where