US special envoy for Ukrainian Affairs Kurt Volker today commented on the decision of the Kremlin to simplify the issuing of Russian passports to inhabitants of the occupied territories of Donetsk and Lugansk regions of Ukraine, calling it a provocation detrimental to the peace process:
«Donbass is Ukraine, and the people there — regardless of preferred language — Ukrainian. Russia’s recent decision on the issuance of passports is a very provocative, is part of the plan for the occupation and undermines efforts to implement the Minsk agreements and to restore control over the Donbass, Ukraine».
Donbas is 🇺🇦 and the people there — regardless of preferred language — are Ukrainian. Russia’s recent decision to issue passports is highly provocative & is straight from its “occupation playbook” and undermines efforts to implement Minsk & restore Donbas to Ukrainian control.
— Kurt Volker (@SpecRepUkraine) April 24, 2019
The decree of Vladimir Putin on the introduction of a simplified procedure of granting Russian citizenship to applicants from the Donetsk and Luhansk regions was published today on the official website of the Kremlin. In accordance with this decree the Russian passports will be given to those interested in the period of three months from the date of treatment on the basis of documents of so-called DNR and LNR (the Pro-Russian administrations in the occupied territories).
US special envoy for Ukrainian Affairs Kurt Volker
The Ukrainian foreign Ministry has issued a statement calling «this document is null and void,» and noting that «it will not change the identity of the inhabitants of the occupied Russian territories of Donbass to the Ukrainian citizenship.» In Kiev turned the international community’s attention to «the fact that the practice of illegal passportization in the Russian-occupied territories were used by the Kremlin in other long-term conflicts both legal and humanitarian pretext for further aggression».
