Russia ‘systematically’ forcing Ukrainians to accept citizenship, US report finds

2023/08/04 Leave a comment

Of note, continuing weaponizing of citizenship:

Ukrainians living in Russian-occupied territory are being forced to assume Russian citizenship or face retaliation, including possible deportation or detention, a new US report has said.

Yale University researchers found that residents of the Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions were being targeted by a systematic effort to strip them of Ukrainian identity.

Ukrainians who do not seek Russian citizenship “are subjected to threats, intimidation, restrictions on humanitarian aid and basic necessities, and possible detention or deportation, all designed to force them to become Russian citizens,” the report said.

Russia’s actions were “classic war crimes in the sense that they are restricting or limiting through this process people’s ability to access critical services and resources that Russia is required to allow all people to access, such as healthcare, and humanitarian systems,” Nathaniel Raymond, the executive director of Yale School of Public Health, told CNN.

Moscow claims to have given Russian passports to more than 3 million Ukrainians since 2014, after the annexation of Crimea and occupation of Ukrainian territories since the launch of its full-scale invasion in 2022.

Russian prime minister Mikhail Mishustin said in May that Moscow had given passports to almost 1.5 million people living in parts of Ukraine’s Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions seized since October last year.

“This number has grown since then, with leaders of the so-called Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR) claiming that three-quarters of residents of that oblast [region] had received Russian citizenship,” the report said.

Russian president Vladimir Putin has signed a series of decrees to compel Ukrainians to get Russian passports, in violation of international humanitarian law, the report said.

The report included a timeline of increasingly aggressive measures to pressure or force Ukrainians to become Russian citizens, starting in May 2014, when Russia illegally annexed Crimea. The timeline continues ahead to July 2024, when, according to new Russian laws, residents without Russian citizenship would be considered “foreigners” or “stateless” and can be detained in detention facilities and/or deported to Russia.

  • March 2014: Russia illegally annexes Crimea and passportisation begins.Nine months after annexation, Russia claims that over 1.5 million people in Crimea have received Russian citizenship.

  • February 2022: Russia’s full-scale invasion begins and Moscow captures parts of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions. Three months later, citizenship application in Kherson and Zaporizhzhia is simplified. This follows the simplification of citizenship applications in Donetsk and Luhansk in 2019. In September 2022. Russia illegally annexes Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson.

  • 18 March 2023: Russia introduces a law on unilateral renunciation of Ukrainian citizenship introduced. The policy allows residents to “renounce” their Ukrainian citizenship unilaterally. Two days later, Putin calls for passportisation to be accelerated and local occupation authorities quickly announce new passporting offices and mobile teams.

  • 27 April 2023: Russia adopts a law that will allow authorities to detain or deport residents without Russian passports. Starting July 2024, residents without Russian citizenship will be considered “foreigners” or “stateless”.

  • 6 June 2023: Destruction of the Kakhovka dam, resulting in widespread flooding and displacement. Russia’s forces use the aftermath to push citizenship on residents. Russian passport holders are made eligible for compensation for the flood damage, whereas Ukrainian passport holders are eligible only for only a small flat payment.

  • 26 June 2023: Planning begins for deportation and detention facilities. The head of the so-called “Donetsk People’s Republic” announces a planning group to study facilities for detaining residents without Russian passports for deportation.

  • 1 July 2024: Ukrainian residents who have not accepted Russian citizenship can be detained and/or deported, including to remote areas of Russia.

The report said: “While states are afforded wide discretion under international law with regards to conferring nationality, customary international law clearly forbids the imposition of citizenship without consent or under duress.”

Source: Russia ‘systematically’ forcing Ukrainians to accept citizenship, US report finds

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Our Favorite Word — ‘Diversity’ — Is Under The Microscope At Mizzou And Yale 

2015/11/13 Leave a comment

More on some of the US debates on diversity:

The Yale debate plugs directly into the bigger, more meta conversation we’re seeing around “diversity.” One group argues that their right to free speech is infringed upon; another says the school promised them — and they’re paying for — a welcoming, inclusive environment.

As Yale made headlines for these incidents, its officials announced something that received far less attention last week: The school will spend $50 million in the next five years to increase diversity of its faculty. That money will go toward recruitment, implicit bias training for employees involved in faculty searches and tenure decisions, and fellowships for graduate students aimed at expanding the pipeline into academia. It’s a tall order; in the 2014-15 academic year, just 22.5 percent of the university’s 4,410 faculty members were minorities, according to CNN Money, while almost 43 percent of the students enrolled at Yale are minorities.

But the conversation about diversity initiatives in corporate culture and Hollywood — and Holmes’ and Harris’ convincing arguments that existing tactics aren’t working — raises the question: Will a browner, more diverse faculty lead to a better atmosphere for college students hungering for more inclusion?

Part of the problem seems to be that institutions — tech companies, media organizations, TV networks, schools — often frame their pursuit of diversity as an achievement in itself. They unveil breathless new initiatives and pat themselves on the back without investigating how existing internal cultures — and their own attitudes — are getting in the way of authentic inclusion.

As Gene wrote last week, diversity “can’t be productive unless there’s real thought about how to invite and productively metabolize pushback against accepted norms, because that pushback is going to come.”

Yale and Missouri are struggling to find their feet under enormous waves of pushback right now. We’ll have to wait and see whether Yale’s new plan to diversify its staff and the turnover at the top at Mizzou will actually do anything to chip away at the tensions they’re seeing on campus.

Source: Our Favorite Word — ‘Diversity’ — Is Under The Microscope At Mizzou And Yale : Code Switch : NPR

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