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Russia speeds up passport process in occupied Ukraine
By EUobserver
Russian president Vladimir Putin signed a decree on Wednesday to accelerate the process of handing Russian citizenship to residents of Ukraine's Russian-occupied Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, Reuters reported. This was already the case in the Russian-backed separatist regions of Donetsk and Luhansk in southeastern Ukraine, where around 800,000 Russian passports have been issued since 2019. Meanwhile, the Russia's parliament has approved a law removing age limits for army recruits.