Ukraine plans to introduce criminal liability for obtaining Russian passport
The bill on bringing to criminal responsibility for obtaining a Russian passport by Ukrainians and calls for this has been registered on the website of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, being initiated by the country’s PM Denys Shmyhal, RIA Novosti reports
The explanatory note to the draft law states that ‘the draft act proposes to supplement the Criminal Code of Ukraine with new articles which envisage criminal liability for a Ukrainian citizen – who is a person authorised to perform the functions of the state or local self-government or as of February 23rd, 2022, was such a person – for entering in the citizenship of the aggressor state and / or the receipt of passport documents of the aggressor state during martial law’.
It is noted that the bill envisages a punishment of 10-15 years in prison for this and a punishment of five to eight years in prison for calls for ‘passportisation’.
Earlier, Ukrainian Deputy PM Iryna Vereshchuk said that the Cabinet of Ministers agreed on changes to the Criminal Code: under the bill, civil servants face a punishment of 10 to 15 years in prison for obtaining a Russian passport.
