Putin expands passport access in breakaway region of Moldova

MOSCOW - Russian President Vladimir Putin has simplified the process for residents of the separatist region of Transnistria to obtain Russian passports, a move seen as increasing pressure on Moldova.

Under a decree published by the Kremlin, residents of Transnistria age 18 and over will be able to acquire Russian citizenship without having to meet the usual requirement of living in Russia for five years.

Transnistria is a narrow strip of land between the Dniester River and Ukraine, largely populated by ethnic Russians. It broke away from Moldova in a war in the early 1990s and is not internationally recognized.

For Moldova, which is seeking to join the European Union, the separatist region remains an unresolved issue. Russia supports Transnistria and has around 1,500 troops stationed there, most of them local residents with Russian citizenship.

The separatist leadership in the regional capital Tiraspol described the decree, which was issued on Friday, as a step to protect Transnistria's population, according to the Russian state news agency TASS. Of the region's roughly 455,000 inhabitants, between 200,000 and 250,000 are already estimated to hold Russian passports.

While Moldova's government in Chișinău did not immediately respond, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Moscow likely hoped to recruit additional soldiers for its war effort. He also accused Russia of seeking to cement Transnistria as part of its sphere of influence.

Observers fear Moscow could use the purported need to protect Russian citizens as leverage. Russia followed a similar approach in eastern Ukraine after 2014, distributing passports in occupied areas before recognizing the separatist regions of Donetsk and Luhansk as independent states ahead of its full-scale invasion in 2022.

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This story was originally published May 16, 2026 at 3:20 PM.