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The Kremlin responded to the words of the future President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyi about the issuance of Ukrainian passports to all persons suffering from the authoritarian regimes.
As Ukrainian outlet Holos Karpat reported, citing the TASS agency, Kremlin Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov said that dual citizenship among the residents of Ukraine would not create any “mess,” and he does not see any contradiction in such possibility. Also he “paid attention to the fact that there are citizens of Ukraine who have Polish [and Ukrainian], or Hungarian [and Ukrainian] passports simultaneously,” the outlet reported.
The head of the President’s Press Secretary expressed complete ignorance of Ukrainian law, which does not recognize dual citizenship.
Ukrainian legislation does not allow its citizens to have dual citizenship. In practice, this requirement of Ukrainian legislation is being implemented with reservations. If a resident of another country receives the citizenship of Ukraine, then while in the country, he will be considered as a citizen of Ukraine only and treated in accordance with Ukrainian law.
The position of “not taking into account” the second citizenship allows, for example, ethnic Poles or Hungarians residing in the territories bordering Poland and Hungary to simplify crossing the border between the countries.
However, this controversy has been brought under the fire of criticism many times. Even becoming the cause of international scandals, especially scandals around disgraced Ukrainian politicians and oligarchs, who often have dual citizenship, or the relatively recent scandal around the issuance of Hungarian passports for Ukrainian citizens.
Dmitry Peskov also mentioned that Ukrainian citizens residing in the temporarily occupied territories helped choose the President of Ukraine. The fact is that the majority of the population of Donbas could not vote because of the Russian occupation.
President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin also responded to the statement of the elected future President during a press briefing, as Obozrevatel reported, citing TASS.
Putin’s comment to the Russian news agency TASS was rather ironic. Putin once again brought up the odious concept of Ukrainian and Russian “fraternal peoples” and, on that basis, Putin believes that he will be able to “make a deal” with Zelenskyi on the disagreement regarding passports.
“If they issue Ukrainian citizenship to Russians, and we to Ukrainians in Russia, we will quickly establish a common denominator and will achieve the desired result,” Putin said, as cited by Obozrevatel. “We will have common citizenship,” Putin added.
Several days ago, Putin signed a decree that allows citizens of the temporarily occupied territories to obtain Russian citizenship “under the simplified procedure.” The future President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyi, suggested issuing Ukrainian passports to everyone who suffers from authoritarian and corrupt regimes, beginning with Russians.
