One country instead of Eurasia Union?

Yesterday several media agencies published information about a proposed bill in Russia that would ease the procedures for granting Russian citizenship to Ukrainians, as well as establishing new procedures for joining the Russian Federation. This new bill is connected with the recent movements in Ukraine. Russians openly say that this bill would allow them not only join entire Ukraine but at least parts of it to their territory.

Since 2001 Russia has a law on joining the Russian federation and forming a new unit within. According to the existing law in Russia, any decision to join Russia shall be made in agreement with Russia and the country that wants to join. According to the existing law, for example, Crimea can join Russia and become a part of the Russian federation only in case if Ukraine agrees. With the proposed bill Russia will amend the law and enable a subject to join its federation in case the people of that subject want (to be defined through referendum).

After adopting this law in Russia, people of Crimea may organize referendum and join Russia.

Literally this means that Russia is ready to take as much as possible from Ukraine. Does this concern Ukraine only? The Russian Duma is discussing a bill for easing the process of granting Russian citizenship to CIS country people. This is an attempt to restore the practice of the Soviet Union citizenship.

Now Russia does not want to demonstrate polite policy as if it wants to cooperate with independent states, as it was in the case of the proposed Eurasia Union. The Russian government is tired of the governments of those countries, and now they want to restore their empire without prolonged plans.

The process is very simple: Russia will grant citizenship to citizens of the target countries, who will express willingness to join Russia through a referendum. Such project may be implemented in Armenia as many Armenian citizens are now also citizens of Russia, and others do their best to get Russian citizenship as well.

Let’s imagine what will happen in Armenia if everyone who applies to the Russian Embassy gets Russian citizenship, and then they organize referendum in Armenia to join Russia. In Armenia fewer people will be against the initiative to join Russia than in Ukraine and generally in the Russian populated areas of South-Eastern Ukraine.

Whether Russia will succeed in implementing this project depends on Ukraine. If Ukraine succeeds in protection of its territorial integrity and resisting Russia’s imperialistic ambitions, the Russian president may revise his plans to restore the Soviet Union. If this fails, the next territory where a national referendum may be organized will be Armenia.

By Avetis Babajanyan