The bill "On Migration Registration of Foreign Citizens and Stateless Persons in the Russian Federation" and amendments to the current law "On the Legal Status of Foreign Citizens in the Russian Federation" were passed by the State Duma by a majority vote. The Communist Party faction and the Rodina faction voted against.
First of all, the parliamentarians simplified the rules for registration and stay of foreign citizens and stateless persons on Russian territory, said one of the bill's authors, head of the Duma committee on constitutional legislation, Vladimir Pligin. "We are talking about a general liberalization of the regime," he explained. Now migrants will not be required to undergo permissive registration with the police. The deputies decided to make life easier for guest workers by introducing a notification procedure for migration registration. The old procedure will remain only in military towns and environmental disaster zones, the committee head added.
Migrants will also be granted the long-awaited freedom of movement, which is prohibited by current legislation. True, only those foreigners who have a temporary residence permit will be able to work in any region of the country. The "mandate" itself will be issued on preferential terms to foreigners arriving from countries with which Russia has a visa-free regime. And these are all CIS states except Georgia and Turkmenistan, the parliamentarian reminded. Citizens of these countries will receive the document without regard to government-set quotas.
Representatives of opposition factions called the bill "extremely harmful." The Communists believed that in practice the new rules would result in a powerful influx of migrants into Russia. "In fact, the bill opens our space to all migration winds," Sergei Reshulsky (Communist Party faction) said indignantly. Deputy Alexander Krutov (Rodina faction) said that "for countries with a dying population, mass migration will be an effective tool for displacing the indigenous population." "Migration quotas are introduced all over the world, but we have it the other way around," the deputy argued his position.
"We are talking about people who quite recently formed a single Soviet people, and the legalization of all migrants will restore historical justice towards once brotherly peoples," Vladimir Pligin tried to convince the parliamentarians. "The attempt to recreate the Soviet people will result in the destruction of Russia," Andrei Savelyev, a deputy from the Rodina faction, retorted.
According to the opposition, the bill is aimed at protecting the rights not of compatriots from the former USSR, but of "everyone who comes to Russia, including for criminal purposes." "Thieves have broken into our house, and instead of kicking them out, we tell them - live," said deputy Nikolai Pavlov (Rodina faction). Communist Albert Makashov believes that after the law comes into force, Russia will face the prospect of "turning into Kosovo."