Russia's new immigration policy targets quality not quantity

© RIA Novosti . Vitaliy Belousov / Go to the mediabankFederal Migration Service Director Konstantin Romodanovsky
Federal Migration Service Director Konstantin Romodanovsky - Sputnik International
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The recent surge in interethnic tension in Russia has forced the authorities to rethink the country's immigration policies, at a time when Russia's growing economy is likely to suffer once again from labor shortages.

The recent surge in interethnic tension in Russia has forced the authorities to rethink the country's immigration policies, at a time when Russia's growing economy is likely to suffer once again from labor shortages.

While recent nationalist riots were triggered by the murder of an ethnic Russian football fan by internal migrants from the North Caucasus, immigrants from the former Soviet Central Asian republics have also been at the center of ethnic strife.

In order to stem a repeat of recent violence, dubbed a threat to Russia's national security by President Dmitry Medvedev, the Federal Migration Service is focusing on two main policies for 2011: better integration of immigrants already living on Russian territory, and raising the caliber of those who come in the future.

The aim is for Russia's migrants to be both well-behaved and highly qualified, Federal Migration Service Director Konstantin Romodanovsky said at a news conference on Wednesday.

One measure for sorting the good from the bad is a new policy of denying visas to foreigners who have broken Russian laws more than twice. Romodanovsky said that 3.5 percent of all crimes in Russia in 2010 were committed by foreign citizens, down from 3.6 percent in 2009.

He said a third of the crimes were connected to workers forging documents in a bid to circumvent Russia's arduous registration rules.

"In mid-2010 we began experimenting with denying entry to Russia to foreigners who have repeatedly violated immigration rules, by, for example, engaging in illegal employment," Romodanovsky said. "In this case we have the right to deny entry for three years."

The migration service said 30,000 people were denied entry to Russia in November and December under the new policy and around 10,000 a month were expected to be refused entry in 2011.

But with its flagging demographic situation, Russia can ill afford to cut its inflow of immigrant workers. Exact figures are hard to come by because many immigrants from CIS nations work in the gray economy, but around 10 percent of the workforce is thought to come from outside Russia.

At the same time as it seeks more control over immigration by workers from the former Soviet Union, the migration service is also introducing measures to attract highly skilled foreign workers as part of the government's drive to modernize the economy and diversify away from commodity exports.

A bill signed into law in July 2010 that grants special three-year visas to "highly qualified specialists" (those who earn more than $66,000 a year) will be extended to create more favorable conditions to a wider category of high-caliber foreign workers.

Romodanovsky expects the number of foreign specialists coming to work in Russia, currently 20,000 a year, to increase to 50,000 in 2011.

Skilled workers form an essential part of President Dmitry Medvedev's modernization program, but the country is also suffering from a significant brain drain, with much local talent fleeing to the more lucrative labor markets of the West.

Nearly a million people have left Russia in the past decade and around 80 percent were highly qualified specialists, the migration service said.

Medvedev himself stressed the seriousness of the problem after the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to two Russian-born scientists working in Britain.

"We do not have a normal system to stimulate our young specialists, talented people, so that they stay to work in this country," the president said.

Efforts are being made to improve conditions for Russian scientists and other specialists. Investment is currently being pumped into a hi-tech research hub near Moscow, dubbed Russia's answer to Silicon Valley, and Medvedev is doing his utmost to attain foreign investment in his pet project.

Whether that will be sufficient to overcome the lure of higher wages and research budgets overseas is another question.

MOSCOW, January 27 (RIA Novosti, Natasha Doff) 

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