Over 1,000 DPR Residents Received Russian Passports In Past 2 Weeks - Migration Service

Over 1,000 people, residing in the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic (DPR), have received Russian passports over the past two weeks, the DPR Interior Ministry's migration service told Sputnik Friday

DONETSK (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 28th June, 2019) Over 1,000 people, residing in the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic (DPR), have received Russian passports over the past two weeks, the DPR Interior Ministry's migration service told Sputnik Friday.

On June 14, Russia started issuing its first passports to DPR residents through a center located in Russia's southern Rostov Region near the Ukrainian border.

"Over 1,000 DPR residents have received their [Russian] passports," a migration official said.

In late May, the migration service said that in 5 weeks, it had received over 4,600 applications for Russian citizenship from DPR residents.

In late April, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree allowing people from DPR and neighboring Luhansk People's Republic in Ukraine's eastern Donbas region to obtain Russian citizenship in a simplified manner. According to the president, the measure is humanitarian and meant to protect people's rights.

Donbas, an area with a predominantly Russian-speaking population, has been engulfed in conflict since 2014, when the Ukrainian authorities unleashed a military operation against the self-proclaimed republics that refused to recognize the new government in Kiev, which came to power after what they considered to be a coup.