Foreign citizens, including labor migrants, or stateless persons will be able to buy SIM cards from Russian mobile operators only if they are registered on State Services portal using biometrics and if they visit telecom stores in person. This follows from the draft law prepared by the Ministry of Digital Development of the Russian Federation.
According to the document, such requirements will not apply to diplomats, representatives of international organizations and refugees.
The bill has been sent to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Federal Security Service, Roskomnadzor, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Federal Communications Agency and the Ministry of Economic Development. The agencies need to agree on it by April 15.
On April 10, the State Duma passed in the first reading a bill aimed at combating the use of fake marriages by migrants to illegally obtain a residence permit in Russia using a simplified scheme.
The government proposed to oblige all migrants arriving in Russia from countries with the possibility of visa-free entry for more than three months to undergo biometric and medical control. These are primarily citizens of the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) who come to Russia to work, the document says.
The document envisages amendments to two federal laws — «On the legal status of foreign citizens in the Russian Federation» and «On state dactyloscopic registration in the Russian Federation». The explanatory note says that it is necessary to develop a mechanism «to ensure proper control over the temporary stay of foreign citizens».
According to the authors of the bill, due to fragmented control over the health of migrants coming to Russia under the visa-free regime for a long period of time, the risk of penetration and spread of dangerous infectious diseases on the territory of the country increases. And the lack of biometric data makes it difficult to track down criminals, terrorists and persons whose stay in Russia is undesirable.
