{"id":39560,"date":"2021-03-11T17:25:03","date_gmt":"2021-03-11T16:25:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/?p=39560"},"modified":"2021-03-11T17:34:51","modified_gmt":"2021-03-11T16:34:51","slug":"more-passports-fewer-labour-migrants-central-asian-migration-to-russia-in-2020","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/tajikistan\/more-passports-fewer-labour-migrants-central-asian-migration-to-russia-in-2020\/","title":{"rendered":"More Russian passports, fewer labour migrants: Central Asian migration to Russia in 2020"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In 2020, Tajikistan overtook Kazakhstan on the list of countries whose citizens received Russian passports in 2020, coming second behind only Ukraine. Last year, a record number of Tajiks\u2014more than 63,000\u2014received citizenship of the country where many of them have been working for three decades.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This article first appeared on Voices on Central Asia<\/a> on 18 February 2021. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

2020 has seriously disrupted the mobility of people around the world, with knock-on effects for migration and the legalization thereof\u2014that is, the receipt of documents regulating legal residence. The closure of borders, including between Russia and the Central Asian republics, meant that more than half of all labour migrants were unable to enter Russia, while those who lost their jobs had to return to their home countries. Fortunately for those who remained, the Russian authorities, facing a labour shortage, provided migration relief, extended the validity of documents, and also halted deportations.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Thus, while the pandemic may have impacted the number of migrants in Russia, the fact remains that in 2020, the Russian Federation provided a record number of passports to new citizens\u2014almost 660,000!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here is a look at the official migration figures published by the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation, which shows some interesting trends for Central Asians in Russia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

New Russians<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Some 145,000 people from Central Asia became citizens of the Russian Federation in 2020. This is about 20,000 more than a year earlier. The growth came among Tajik citizens, who overtook citizens of Kazakhstan on the list of Central Asian countries whose citizens received the highest number of Russian passports in a year. On this peculiar ranking, Tajikistan is second only to Ukraine, hundreds of thousands of whose former and current citizens become Russians every year. In 2020, almost 410,000 Ukrainians received a Russian passport through a simplified process; they comprised 63% of all new Russians in 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The former Soviet republics (excluding the Baltic states, Georgia, and Turkmenistan) retain their traditional interest in Russian citizenship, reflected in five-digit numbers of applications. Among the Central Asian republics, more citizens became new Russians in 2020 than in 2019 in all the republics other than Kazakhstan, which saw a decline of 7,000 compared to 2019. In Kazakhstan, it is ethnic Russians who most often apply for Russian citizenship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If some simplified schemes for legal labor migration are created, it is possible that the number of Central Asians who wish to obtain Russian citizenship will decline. After all, the reason to apply for citizenship is to be able to work legally in the Russian Federation without any constraints or the need to pay for a costly patent <\/em>(work authorisation). This may explain, for example, the comparatively lower numbers of Kyrgyzstanis applying for Russian citizenship, as they can already work in Russia on their own passports as part of the Eurasian Economic Union.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The relatively small number of Uzbeks among those receiving Russian citizenship (there are fewer of them than, for example, Armenians, and almost as many as Moldovans and Azerbaijanis) may be explained by Uzbekistan\u2019s strict prohibition on dual citizenship\u2014which comes with a requirement that the decree renouncing Uzbek citizenship be signed by the president himself. Moreover, those Uzbeks and Turkmens who apply for foreign citizenship usually do so in non-CIS countries. Some Turkmens held dual citizenship with the Russian Federation until 2003, but now they cannot even enter the country without a visa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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