Putin Decree Gives All Ukrainians Path to Russian Citizenship
Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree on Monday extending a simplified Russian naturalisation process to all citizens of Ukraine, a document published on the government's website showed.
Previously, a simplified procedure for acquiring Russian citizenship applied only to residents of the self-proclaimed breakaway territories of the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) and Luhansk People's Republic (LPR) in eastern Ukraine, which Russia seeks to "liberate" from Kyiv's control, as well as the Russian-occupied regions of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, the state news agency TASS reported.
Putin's decree orders that "all citizens of Ukraine" be given "the right to apply for admission to the citizenship of the Russian Federation in a simplified manner."
Russia first introduced the simplified passportization scheme to residents of the separatist Donetsk and Luhansk "people's republics" of eastern Ukraine in 2019. The program was expanded in May 2022, three months into Russia's invasion of Ukraine, to include Ukrainians living in the Russia-occupied Kherson region and the partially occupied Zaporizhzhia region.
Kyiv's foreign ministry condemned Monday's decree as an "encroachment" on its sovereignty and territorial integrity, adding that the naturalization of Ukrainians is "incompatible" with international law. "Ukrainians do not need Putin's citizenship and attempts to impose it by force are doomed to failure," Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said.
Source: Reuters
(https://www.reuters.com/world/....europe/putin-decree-
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