The number of Russian citizens living in Latvia with a valid residence permit has decreased by approximately 11,800 people since the summer of 2022, the head of the Office of Citizenship and Migration Affairs (UDGM) Ilze Briede reported to the parliamentary investigative commission on migration regulation on Tuesday.
On Tuesday, the commission discussed the issue of permanent residence permits in Latvia and the status of permanent residents of the European Union.
Briede reported that at the beginning of this year, there were 1,166 people living in Latvia with the status of individuals who were citizens or non-citizens of Latvia before obtaining citizenship of another country. Among them, the largest group was citizens of Ukraine - 388 people, 273 were citizens of Russia, 302 were citizens of Belarus, and 21 each were citizens of Israel and Moldova.
Briede added that the process of implementing amendments to the immigration law, which require Russian citizens to reapply for residence permits to obtain EU permanent resident status, has not yet been completed.
The amendments to the immigration law, adopted in September 2022, changed the procedure for obtaining residence permits (RP) for Russian citizens. According to the amendments, Russian citizens who were citizens of Latvia or non-citizens of Latvia before obtaining citizenship of another country and have been living in Latvia with a permanent residence permit were required to submit documents to the UDGM confirming their knowledge of the state language at the A2 level.
In total, about 30,000 Russian citizens were required to reapply for their residence permits by passing a state language test and confirming compliance with other criteria to obtain EU permanent resident status.
In March of this year, about 15,000 people with EU permanent resident status and 1,238 people with permanent residence permits were living in Latvia.
Additionally, about 2,700 Russian citizens are still living in Latvia with residence permits that allowed two years to take the Latvian language test and apply for EU permanent resident status.
Initially, nearly 5,000 people received such residence permits, but half of them subsequently switched to other residence permits.
As for those who did not qualify for the status or did not submit any applications, 84 exit orders were issued and 22 decisions on forced expulsion were made. To date, about 2,600 Russian citizens have voluntarily left the country.
