More than 100,000 residents of DPR, LPR receive Russian citizenship in fast-track procedure
DONETSK. Dec 10 (Interfax) - More than 100,000 residents of the self-proclaimed Donbas republics have received Russian citizenship since the date the fast-track naturalization order took effect, representatives of the republics said at a roundtable entitled Results and Prospects of Integration Processes between Donbas and Russia.
"As many as 72,000 sets of documents have been accepted, 71,000 have been directed to the Federal Migration Service, and 54,000 [passports] have been issued," Deputy Foreign Minister of the Luhansk People's Republic (LPR) Anna Soroka said at the roundtable.
Head of the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) Migration Service Ruslan Opolonik said that more than 50,000 Russian passports have been issued in the self-proclaimed republic.
"Our Migration Service has received 70,700 applications, and 51,000 [Russian passports] have been issued," Opolonik said.
State Duma deputy Andrei Kozenko, for his part, called for cancelling the state duty levied in the issuance of Russian passports for residents of the DPR and LPR.
Russian Interior Minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev said on Monday that over 120,000 residents of the Donbas republics had been naturalized since April 2019.