The Russian police raid of a confections factory owned by Ukrainian candy mogul and EuroMaidan Revolution supporter Petro Poroshenko in Lipetsk on March 19 was officially conducted “to search for illegal migrants.”
The action, however, may be a thinly veiled threat to Ukrainian citizens working in Russia amid heightened tensions between the two neighbors over the Kremlin’s annexation of the Crimean peninsula.
Any sudden deportation of 2.9 million migrant workers of Ukrainians could bring many of the newly jobless back to their homeland, costing the Ukrainian economy $2 billion in remittances.
But it appears, at least for the moment, that Poroshenko’s political views were the target – not the start of a mass campaign by Russia to deport Ukrainians.
“We have not received any complaints from our people in Russia,” said Serhiy Oliynyk, chairman of the Ukrainian Trade Union for Migrants-Workers, “and we are not expecting any. Russian businesses need Ukrainian workers. The political crisis is concentrated at the top, with (Russian President Vladimir) Putin.”
The main issue, Oliynyk said, is border control. He fears the introduction of visas between Ukraine and Russia, which would make crossing the border more expensive and complicated. “This issue should be resolved in the near future, though,” Oliynyk hopes.
Russia remains Ukraine’s largest trade partner, although the bilateral dependence is lessening.
The countries’ mutual trade turnover in 2013 was $45.5 billion, 11 percent less compared to the previous year. Machinery, metal and food products are main components of Ukrainian exports to Russia, while Ukraine purchases mostly gas, fuels and mineral products from the neighbor.
The situation has already become complicated.
At 10 p.m. on March 19, without warning, Russia closed the border with Ukraine to vehicular traffic, leaving a long queue of semi-trailers on the Ukrainian side unable to deliver cargo.
However, the border was reopened in certain places the next day by 11 a.m. Then, the Russian Border Service announced that the border will be closed along Kharkiv, Sumy and Luhansk oblasts at 6 p.m. on March 20 for people in both countries residing in the border regions.
Russia’s customs service on March 20 said it had “strengthened controls” on the border with Ukraine because of information about imports of banned goods including weapons, but denied that it had closed the border or stopped imports altogether. The Federal Security Bureau earlier said it had blocked a Russian-Ukrainian group that had attempted to smuggle guns into the country at a border crossing near the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don.
However, Ukrainian exports to Russia have been a target of all kinds of bans and sanctions during recent years as Ukraine was approaching signing the Association Agreement with the European Union in November 2013, while Russia heavily opposed it. Agreement was not signed then as Viktor Yanukovych’s and Mykola Azarov’s government decided to build closer ties with the Russian Federation that lead to EuroMaidan protests which ended up with an overthrow of the Party of Regions’ rule.
Meanwhile, now Russian sanctions include also freezing the Ukrainian assets in Russia. Thus, Poroshenko’s Roshen announced on March 20 that, in addition to the raid, which has effectively closed its plant, its accounts in Russia had been seized on March 14. The factories and their 3,000 employees have not been working since then.
These troubles could be the Kremlin’s response to Ukraine’s March 19 decision to leave the CIS and the National Security Council’s proposal to introduce a visa regime for Russia. Already on March 20, Prime Minister Arseniy Yatseniuk went into damage control, saying that there was no reason to introduce a visa regime with Russia.
Ukrainians working in Russia could suffer the fate of foreign teachers at the Atlantic International School in Moscow in early March, who were forced to leave the country on the grounds of having the wrong visa and were subsequently banned from entering Russia for five years. Or worse, they could be subject to harassment, as happened to Central Asian and Caucasus migrants in Moscow last July-August, when hundreds were deported for not having their papers in order.
The importance of Russian job market for Ukrainians cannot be overestimated as Russia remains the most popular destination of country’s migrant workers with 43.2 percent of their total number. They earn annually about $30 billion.
Construction and trade are the main sectors of Russian economy that is of interest for Ukrainian migrants. Usually they do not obtain official work permits from the Russian authorities, though formally need them. So far Russian legislation allows Ukrainian citizens to stay for 90 days without any registration, while the only document necessary to prove the legal foundations of stay in Russia is a migration card provided to everyone who is crossing the Russian border.
Kyiv Post business journalist Evan Ostryzniuk can be reached at [email protected].
