The Presidential Executive Office is to organise work within the activities of the working group on implementing the State Migration Policy Concept of the Russian Federation for 2019–2025 to reform the migration regimes and the institute of Russian Federation citizenship based on the proposals of the group.
The Government, the Interior Ministry, the Foreign Ministry and the Federal Security Service, working together with the Presidential Executive Office, are to adjust the plan of actions to be taken in 2019–2021 to implement the State Migration Policy Concept of the Russian Federation for 2019–2025.
The document sets out proposals for reforming the migration regimes and the institute of citizenship of the Russian Federation, including the objective of the migration policy, the mechanisms for its implementation and the related conditions for granting Russian Federation citizenship to foreign citizens and stateless persons.
To attain the objective set out in the Concept, issues of reforming the migration regimes and the institute of citizenship were addressed in the following main areas:
- the creation of favourable conditions for the resettlement to the Russian Federation and the granting (optionally) of Russian citizenship to Russian speaking persons with a mental and cultural affinity;
- the formulation of unambiguous migration rules for those who are ready to choose the Russian Federation as their new place of residence, as well as for those who come to Russia on a temporary basis for tourism or employment, educational and other reasons; and
- the promotion of security standards, including through a broader introduction of modern information technologies to the systems of state services and state control.
The proposals worked out by the group envisage:
- improvement of the institutes of permanent residence (permanent resident status) and citizenship of the Russian Federation;
- creation of a standardised migration regime for long-term residence on the territory of the Russian Federation;
- modernisation of the mechanism for regulating labour migration;
- improvement of the mechanism for ensuring security and law and order in the field of migration;
- digitalisation of migration governance; and
- additional measures to ensure the implementation of the reform.
In particular, it has been proposed to establish three procedures for awarding Russian citizenship: general, simplified and special. An obligatory condition stipulated for awarding long-term resident status to foreign citizens is a valid account in the state information system, the registration of which requires the provision of biometric personal data. In addition, modern digital technology is to be introduced for analysing the migration situation, organising the provision of state services and for state control in the sphere of migration.
Additional measures for implementing the reform include a wide-ranging information campaign to explain the parameters of the reform and the use of diplomatic channels when working with foreign partners, primarily member states of the Eurasian Economic Union; measures to strengthen the potential of the migration departments of the Interior Ministry bodies and federal executive bodies in charge of labour and employment; as well as stronger measures to protect the personal data of foreign citizens.