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Russia Launches ‘Passportization’ in Occupied

Ukrainian Donbas (Part One)
Publication: Eurasia Daily Monitor Volume: 16 Issue: 63
By: Vladimir Socor (https://jamestown.org/analyst/vladimir-socor/)
May 1, 2019 05:53 PM Age: 4 days

(Source: RT)

On April 24, Russian President Vladimir Putin issued a decree—with immediate effect—
simplifying the procedure for granting Russia’s citizenship to residents of “certain areas of
Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk provinces” (Kremlin.ru, April 24), i.e., the Russian-occupied
territory in Ukraine’s Donbas. Those residents are, by legal definition (since 1991), citizens of
Ukraine on Ukraine’s territory; but Putin’s decree intends to supplant their Ukrainian
citizenship. This decree is the latest in the series of Russia’s legislative and economic moves
to wrest these areas from Ukraine in real terms and incorporate them de facto—but not yet
officially—into Russia. This is Russia’s third “passportization” project, after those in the
Russian-occupied territories of Georgia (Abkhazia and South Ossetia) and Moldova
(Transnistria).

On May 1, Putin followed up with a similar decree, covering citizens of Ukraine who formerly
resided in those same Donetsk and Luhansk areas, as well as in Crimea, but moved to Russia
since 2014 and are currently residing there. They, too, are made eligible for receiving Russia’s
citizenship through the simplified procedure (Kremlin.ru, May 1). The cut-off dates for
eligibility are April 2014 for former residents of the Donetsk-Luhansk areas, and March 2014
for former residents of Crimea (those dates mark the start of military operations in Donetsk-
Luhansk and the Russian annexation of Crimea, respectively).

“Certain areas of Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk provinces” is the Minsk “agreements’  ”
euphemism for the Russian-occupied territory. Under Putin’s decree, residents of those
areas are to apply for Russian citizenship at offices of Russia’s Internal Affairs Ministry (MVD).
The applicants need to show identity documents issued by the Donetsk and Luhansk
“authorities” (only Russia recognizes those documents as valid). Applicants are not required
to renounce their Ukrainian citizenship. The Russian MVD offices are to examine the
applications, administer the oath of Russian citizenship, and issue Russian passports to these
new citizens, within a period of maximum three months from the submission of the
application (Kremlin.ru, April 24).

According to Russian MVD’s Main Directorate on Migration, the “simplified” procedure

means not only a shorter waiting time (it would take much longer normally), but also that
Donetsk-Luhansk applicants are not required to show permits for temporary or permanent
residency in Russia as a prerequisite to receiving citizenship.

The MVD or other Russian institutions will not go into the Donetsk and Luhansk “People’s
Republics” (DPR, LPR) to take applications and distribute passports there. Nor will “DPR-
LPR” residents go to Russia to apply and pick up passports there. Instead, the MVD has just
opened two application-processing and passport-issuing centers (one for each “republic”) in
Russia’s nearby Rostov Oblast (Interfax, April 29).

The “DPR’s” and “LPR’s” “migration services” shall take applications for Russian citizenship
from local residents, carry batches of applications to the two centers just across the border
on Russia’s territory, and then carry batches of Russian passports back to the “DPR-LPR,”
where local residents will individually pick up their new Russian passports (Donetskoye
Agentstvo Novostey, Lugansk Infotsentr, April 26–April 30).
These procedures help to maximize the number of applicants by, practically, thrusting
Russian passports in their lap (“only the lazy will not take this,” goes the Russian phrase).
Politically, through this procedure, Russia pretends that it is not violating international laws
that forbid changing the citizenship of populations in occupied territories, even if the grant
of Russian citizenship in this case itself confirms the fact of the occupation.

Recipients of Russian citizenship in “DPR-LPR” are not asked to renounce their Ukrainian
citizenship. However, Ukraine’s Law on Citizenship rules out dual citizenship. Citizens of
Ukraine must renounce Ukrainian citizenship if they acquire the citizenship of another state.
For its part, Russia undoubtedly wants its newly baked citizens in Donbas to maintain their
Ukrainian citizenship and the right to vote in Ukraine’s elections, in case the territory is
returned to Ukraine on the Russian-designed Minsk terms. Those terms envisage local
elections to be staged in the Russian-controlled Donetsk-Luhansk territory, followed by the
territory’s full return to the Ukrainian political system. The combined effect would solidify the
Russian control locally and create a substantial pro-Russia bloc holding the balance in the
Ukrainian parliament.

Approximately four million people are estimated to have resided before 2014 in the part of
Donbas now under Russian control. The current number is definitely less, but not
conclusively estimated. Refugees from the war have moved in part to Russia and in part to
Ukraine’s interior.

Applying for Russian citizenship is not necessarily an indicator of political motivation, nor of
a well-considered or internalized allegiance to the Russian state on the part of the applicant.
Those factors will be at work in a limited number of cases. Rather, the applicants’ primary
motives will undoubtedly be to qualify for Russian old-age pensions, to find employment in
Russia, to study in Russia, to seek business opportunities in Russia, and (for many of those
involved in war crimes) to be certain of impunity.

Putin personally anticipates that one third of the number of applicants will be pensioners
(TASS, April 27), but he has not indicated what he expects the overall number of applications
to be.

Passportization in this territory will not be immediate or total. Russia’s previous mass-
passportization program, undertaken in Abkhazia and South Ossetia, lasted six years (2002–
2008) and helped pave the way for the military invasion of Georgia. The passportization
process is currently at the half-way point in Moldova’s Transnistria. The Kremlin is using a
gradualist approach to passportization, both as a political-diplomatic tactic and considering
the limitations on Russia’s resources.

In the Russian-controlled Donbas, passportization will likely proceed in stages. Locally

recruited military personnel and Russian-installed civilian officials will probably be given
priority to receive Russian citizenship. The distribution of Russian passports to local military
personnel started before the publication of Putin’s decree (RFE/RL, Nastoyashcheye Vremya,
April 24).

*To read Part Two, please click here.

(https://jamestown.org/program/russia-launches-
passportization-in-occupied-ukrainian-donbas-part-two/)

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