Russia has significantly increased the costs for obtaining Russian citizenship through consular institutions, shortly after President Vladimir Putin simplified, in May, the procedure for granting citizenship to the residents of the Transnistrian region of the Republic of Moldova, reports IPN.

The decree signed by Putin exempts residents of the Transnistrian region over the age of 18, who permanently reside on the left bank of the Dniester, from the obligation to have a domicile in Russia and from taking Russian language, history and legislation exams to obtain Russian Federation citizenship.

Two months after simplifying the procedure, the Moscow Government approved new consular fees for examining citizenship applications.

The fee for examining an application for acquiring Russian citizenship has increased from 65 to 600 dollars. In the case of renunciation of citizenship, the fee has been raised from 130 to 1,200 dollars. The payment will be charged for each person included in the application, not for a single request, as it was until now.

The new rates for these services were also published on the website of the Embassy of the Russian Federation in Chisinau.

Thus, although the procedure for obtaining Russian citizenship for the residents of the Transnistrian region has been simplified, the costs for processing the documents will be considerably higher.

In recent years, Russia has expanded simplified mechanisms for granting citizenship to residents of unrecognized or occupied territories. Similar procedures have been applied in Abkhazia, South Ossetia and in the occupied Ukrainian regions of Ukraine.