Maksym Beznosiuk
The Kremlin is systematically erasing Ukrainian identity in occupied regions to solidify long-term submission and control by banning Ukrainian in schools, rewriting history, and indoctrinating children.
In the occupied territories, the Kremlin is linking Russian citizenship to access to healthcare, SIM cards, and basic services, coercing Ukrainians into seeking Russian passports and turning survival into a lever for loyalty.
Forced mobilization of Ukrainians, including abducted children reaching adulthood, indicates how occupation policies feed directly into Russia’s war machine and amount to demographic warfare.
On July 17, the Russian State Duma approved a law that expands the grounds for revoking naturalized citizenship, adding 17 more offenses to the current 64 articles of the Criminal Code. The law, however, will not apply to Russian citizens living in the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk “people’s republics,” the occupied parts of Ukraine’s Kherson and Zaporizhzhia oblasts, or Crimea (Glavcom; Meduza, July 17). This signals the Kremlin’s willingness to increase administrative and legal pressure in its attempts to control and subdue Ukrainians in the occupied territories.
This development showcases how the Kremlin is weaponizing citizenship as a coercive tool that goes beyond administration, serving as part of a broader strategy to erase Ukrainian identity, impose pro-Russian loyalty, and militarize the occupied population. This is a continuation of the deliberate strategy of enforcing citizenship on Ukrainians, which started following the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Throughout 2024, the Kremlin pressured Ukrainians residing in occupied territories to obtain Russian citizenship to access medical care and other social benefits in the Russian-occupied regions of Zaporizhzhia and Luhansk oblasts (Kyiv Independent, January 22, 2024; REACH, January 2). The Kremlin has also restricted access to mobile communications, making it impossible to obtain a SIM card from local mobile operators without a Russian passport (DW, April 10).
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