Ukrainians and Belarusians were imported by Tajiks – Kommersant

The organization for helping refugees and migrants “Civil Assistance” (included in the register of foreign agents) studied the migration statistics of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. As it turned out, in the first quarter of 2023, there were changes in terms of the interest of residents of the post-Soviet countries in obtaining Russian citizenship. Natives of Belarus, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Georgia have become noticeably less likely to apply for a Russian passport. But among the “new Russians” there are more immigrants from Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Turkmenistan.

In May, the Ministry of Internal Affairs published a summary of the migration situation from January to April. After analyzing these data, Civic Assistance experts found a decrease in the number of foreigners and stateless persons who received Russian passports through the system of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

• In 2021, 735,385 people received Russian citizenship, in 2022 – 691,045 people.
• In the first quarter of 2023, 106,320 people received Russian passports (for the same period in 2022 – 141,663 people).

About 97% of those who received citizenship in the first quarter of 2023 come from the republics of the former USSR. The data of the Ministry of Internal Affairs show that the citizens of a number of these states are less interested in Russian citizenship than before. So, if in the first quarter of 2022, 55,336 Ukrainians were granted citizenship of the Russian Federation and this accounted for 39% of the total number of foreigners admitted to citizenship, then in the first quarter of this year this number was 22,039 (only 20% of the total number, a decline year to year by 60%). Civic Assistance did not analyze the “Ukrainian” part of the statistics, noting that the report of the Ministry of Internal Affairs does not include Russian passports issued during this time to immigrants or residents of Donbass, Kherson and Zaporozhye regions. In addition to Ukrainians, the largest decline in the number of those who received Russian citizenship is noted “among Belarusians (46% less than last year), Azerbaijanis (40%), Kazakhs (37%) and Georgians (35%).”

However, they were replaced by people from Tajikistan — they make up 42% of the total number of those accepted into Russian citizenship from January to April 2023 (a year ago this share was 23%, and in the same period of 2021 — only 12.5%).

• In the first quarter of 2022, 33,084 Tajiks received a Russian passport, and in the first quarter of this year there were already 44,854 of them (36% more).
• A certain increase is also shown by the natives of Kyrgyzstan (5028 received citizenship in the first quarter of 2022, 5400 this year; an increase of 7%) and Turkmenistan (699 in the first quarter of last year, 912 this year; an increase of 31%).

The number of “new” Russians from Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan is explained by the experts of “Assistance” by the low standard of living in these countries. “At the same time, people from Uzbekistan, which follows Kyrgyzstan in the ranking of the poorest post-Soviet countries, have sharply lost interest in obtaining Russian citizenship,” the researchers note. compared to the same period in 2022.

“I believe the drop is due to the fact that partial mobilization was announced in 2022. Therefore, many have suspended their process of obtaining citizenship,” said Vyacheslav Postavnin, an expert on migration issues, commenting on the statistics. He connects this not only with the immediate risk of mobilization, but also with the position of the states of origin: the Uzbek authorities, for example, have clearly stated that if they participate in hostilities in Ukraine, they will prosecute their citizens as criminals, the expert recalls. The related concerns may, in his opinion, reduce the attractiveness of Russian citizenship.

Civic Assistance also analyzed data on the number of residents of territories affected by the Russian-Ukrainian conflict who arrived in Russia.

• For the whole of 2022, the status of “temporary asylum” (unlike the status of “refugee” is granted for up to one year) received 98,632 people, of which 99% came from the territory of Ukraine.
• By the end of the year, 67,496 of them remained in Russia. In April 2023, there were 53,719 people in Russia with temporary asylum status (96% were from Ukraine).
• Actually, there were 304 refugees in Russia at the end of 2022, and now there are 276, and this is the smallest number since 1991.

Civic Assistance notes the discrepancy between the data on the number of Ukrainians with temporary asylum status and numerous reports of hundreds of thousands of refugees from Ukraine in the Russian Federation after the start of a special military operation. In the spring of 2023, a number of media reported that in the first quarter of this year alone, 400 thousand refugees from Ukraine arrived in Russia, and in total their number since the beginning of the NWO, according to some estimates, reached several million. However, according to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, in the first quarter of 2023, only 2,092 people from Ukraine applied for temporary asylum, and not one for refugee status.

The organization’s experts believe that more than 30,000 temporary asylum holders fell out of the 2023 statistics because they received a temporary residence permit, residence permit or Russian passport.

Vyacheslav Postavnin agrees with this version and adds: “Inhabitants of the new territories, even if someone received the status of temporary asylum, can now obtain citizenship – as those born and now living on the territory of the Russian Federation. All those who needed to obtain refugee status or temporary asylum have already received it. Everything necessary for this has already been done.”

Kommersant sent a request to the Ministry of Internal Affairs with a request to comment on the statistics, but by the time of publication had not received a response.

Emilia Gabdullina