By Andrew Korybko, Substack, 8/20/24

Putin signed a decree on Monday (August 19, 2024) liberalizing his country’s immigration system to facilitate the emigration of Western socio-cultural dissidents who oppose their homelands’ neoliberal ideology. Renowned Russian immigration lawyer Timur Beslangurov, whose excellent services can be solicited from his website, translated the full text in a post on his “Moving To Russia” Telegram channel. He then thanked Duma member Maria Butina for helping to make this “revolutionary” move happen.

That’s not hyperbole either since Russia hitherto had some of the strictest and most byzantine immigration procedures in the world, though only for applicants from outside the former USSR. It was even cautioned in February that “Russia’s Embrace Of Traditional Values-Espousing Immigrants Won’t Be As Simple As Some Think” precisely for that reason. Interested immigrants were advised to learn Russian at a semi-decent level if they wanted any realistic chance of moving there and making a living.   

The new decree changes all of that by removing the language, history, and knowledge of law requirements for applying for temporary residency and even getting rid of the hated quota system. There’ll also be a streamlined procedure for granting three-month single-entry visas. To paraphrase the famous saying, “Russians take a while to saddle up, but when they finally ride, they ride fast.” This development was a long time coming and the result of lots of hard work, but it’s now a reality.

What this means is that anyone who opposes the West’s liberal-globalist socio-cultural policies has the opportunity to start a new life in Russia, though that’ll still of course be easier said than done if they actually decide to come there. They’ll have to have enough money saved up to rent a place or at least a hostel, not to mention to support themselves until they find a job, which is difficult to do until they receive their temporary residency permit.

In the meantime, it would obviously be a good idea for them to take Russian lessons, and some might freelance teaching English (perhaps as a quid pro quo) until they can legally join a teaching company. That, publicly financed media, farming, and specialized tech services are the most likely jobs that Western socio-cultural dissidents will end up having if they move to Russia since options are greatly limited for non-Russian speakers seeing as how few people there speak a foreign language at any level.

It might therefore be an admittedly intimidating and overwhelming experience for the average Westerner who decides to start a new life in Russia, thus leading to only the most passionate ones taking the plunge as well as those without the “baggage” (real estate, dependents, etc.) that could hinder this. Nevertheless, it should come as a huge relief for all of them to know that they still have this opportunity if they ever feel that they can’t comfortably live in their homelands’ liberal-globalist society any longer.

Russia is finally embracing its role as a refuge for them from the aforesaid evils by showing that it sympathizes with their plight, to which end it’s now facilitating their emigration by revolutionizing its byzantine immigration system with long-overdue radical reforms for this promising class of immigrants. Even those like-minded folks who don’t take up this opportunity will still appreciate that they’re always welcome there, which will go a long way towards winning more hearts and minds in the West.