Press Release, 20.12.2017

Speaking at the State Duma Nikolai Rybakov, Deputy Chairman of the Yabloko party, criticised the bill on migration registration for foreign citizens and stateless persons developed by MP Irina Yarovaya (the United Russia faction), which was discussed today in the lower House of Parliament.

According to Rybakov, the bill proposed “repressive measures against migrants and entrepreneurs”, rather than provided answers to the present challenges. He stressed that basic solutions to the problems with migration laid in the systemic fight against corruption, while the Irina Yarovaya’s bill would only increase corruption.

He also voiced the proposals developed by the Yabloko party, that would allow to eliminate the causes of illegal migration. First, hard and manual labour should be replaced by modern technological processes. “We need to create a knowledge-based economy in Russia and move away from the economy based on oil and gas,” Nikolai Rybakov emphasised.

The second measure proposed by Yabloko is creation of conditions when education and qualification would be valued at work. The party believes that it is necessary to stop the so-called optimisation of educational institutions. According to Rybakov, the number of colleges had been reduced by 50 per cent in ten years.

The third measure is removal of the conditions when it is profitable for employers to hire migrants deprived of any rights and use them as slaves. Yabloko believes that a migrant can count on work only if the job vacancy is not filled by Russian nationals. “However, this norm will work only when migrants enjoy the same rights as our citizens. It is necessary to employ people only with the contract of medical insurance. Then migrants’ labour will not be so cheap so that to oust the labor of Russians,” he said.

Rybakov also urged the deputies of the Duma to put things in order in the migration centres, calling them “the nine circles of hell” for migrants. He noted that the state had been pushing migrants into the illegal sphere.

Yabloko also criticised the abolition of the federal migration service and the transfer of its functions to the Ministry of Internal Affairs. “We believe that the civil service should be engaged in migrants issues,” Rybakov stressed.

In conclusion, Rybakov again stressed that the solution of migration problems was “not in the rigidity of legislation, but in its implementation and understanding of how the modern economy is structured in the 21st century”.

The proposals developed by Yabloko and its presidential candidate Grigory Yavlinsky on migration policy were handed to the leaders of the State Duma.

Today the State Duma had to hold a “government’s hour” dedicated to the situation in the sports, Russia’s participation in the Olympics and the FIFA World Cup. It was envisaged that Pavel Kolobkov, Minister of Sports, and Vitaly Mutko, Vice Prime Minister supervising sports and Director of the Russian Football Union, had to speak before the Duma. However, the “government’s hour” on this topic was canceled in less than 24 hours, as the officials refused to come. Yabloko Chair Emilia Slabunova had to address the Duma at this event. As the event was cancelled she published the text of her speech to the parliament.

According to Slabunova, the removal of the Russian team from the Olympics resulted from the irresponsible policy of the country’s leadership, who in order to throw dust into the world’s eyes, made lies and the use of doping a state policy.