Russian Investigative Committee head says naturalized citizens who refuse to fight in war should lose citizenship
The head of Russia’s Investigative Committee, Alexander Bastrykin, has suggested stripping migrants of Russian citizenship if they refuse to fight in the war in Ukraine. Bastrykin made the remarks during a conference organized by the Russian Military Officers’ Club.
“As long as there is a special military operation, I think, it’s necessary to recruit [migrants] to fight in the special military operation. If you are not ready, as a citizen of the Russian Federation, to fulfill your military duty, then [we] should decide to revoke such a person’s citizenship,” Bastrykin said.
This is not the first time that Bastrykin has spoken about the role of naturalized Russian citizens in the war, saying in a January 2023 interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta that naturalized citizens should be prioritized for recruitment. According to Bastrykin, in the first half of 2022 alone, more than 60,000 former residents of Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan received Russian citizenship and, “therefore, not only the rights [granted by citizenship] but also the constitutional obligation to protect the country that adopted them.”
In September 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree simplifying the naturalization process for those who sign a military contract.
