[LINK] "Want to Become a Russian in Crimea? Join the Queue"

[rfmcdonald]

The Moscow Times' Eva Hartog reports on how becoming a Russian citizen if you are one of the nearly two million people of Crimea can be difficult, even if you want to be a citizen.

At least 100,000 Crimeans were unable to obtain Russian citizenship in the year following the peninsula's annexation by Russia, federal human rights ombudswoman Ella Pamfilova estimated in a report published on her department's website in May.

[. . .]

Most of the thousands of those living without official Russian citizenship are people who were born in mainland Ukraine but, despite spending years and sometimes decades living and working in Crimea, never re-registered as residents of Crimea.

Under Ukrainian rule, authorities mostly turned a blind eye to the 'illegal' section of the Crimean population. Crimea was, after all, part of the same country.

But since Russia's annexation of the peninsula in March last year, these Crimeans have been branded foreigners on what was once their own soil until they convince the authorities otherwise.

Following Russia's formal annexation of the peninsula on March 18 last year, all Crimean residents — a mix of ethnic Russians, ethnic Ukrainians and Crimean Tatars — were automatically declared Russian citizens unless they made use of a one-month window to renounce their new status.

In practice, however, the burden of proof was on Crimeans themselves — until they acquired a Russian passport, they would de facto be considered foreigners.