“Migrant! You can go home”

Posters have appeared in cities and regions of Russia calling for labor migrants to go home.

A Tajik migrant sent a photo of a poster in the city of Novosibirsk to Azda TV, which urges migrants to leave Russia.

“Migrant! Good news. The borders are open. You can go home and help the economy of your country!”, the poster reads.

The call is directed at citizens of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan, Georgia, Armenia, and Tajikistan. The poster also features the flags of these countries, as well as the phrase “Time to go home” in Kazakh, Uzbek, Turkmen, Azerbaijani, Kyrgyz, Georgian, Armenian, and Tajik languages.

It is still unknown who put up these posters – the authorities or local residents.

Photo: Internet

Recently, there has been an increasing atmosphere of hostility towards migrants in Russia, with residents and authorities openly expressing their dissatisfaction with the presence of migrants. Law enforcement agencies are constantly conducting mass raids and checks, detaining migrants by the dozens, and deporting some.

Earlier, residents of the city of Kotelniki in the Moscow region, in their video address to Putin, supported mass checks of migrants by law enforcement agencies and proposed urgently stopping the influx of migrants entering the country. They also complained about “offenses” and the increasing number of migrants in the city.

Some State Duma deputies and officials have also made anti-migrant statements and called for the introduction of visas with Central Asian countries, to ban migrants from entering, or to send them to war.

Following these addresses, mass “raids” against migrants began in most cities and regions of Russia.

Videos are being published on social media showing Russian law enforcement agencies mass detaining migrants and sending them to temporary detention facilities. Some footage also shows migrants lying on the ground with their hands behind their heads, while law enforcement officers treat them harshly and insult them.

Migrants report that Russian law enforcement agencies are conducting checks at residences and workplaces, detaining everyone indiscriminately, even those with proper documents. According to migrants, later those with correctly issued documents are released, while those without documents are detained or deported, and, according to unconfirmed reports, detained migrants are sent to fight in Ukraine.

It was previously reported that the Spiritual Administration of Muslims of the Moscow Region, in its statement, “categorically condemns the barbaric actions of OMON officers,” called this raid “humiliating,” and emphasized that the raid resembled “an operation to detain particularly dangerous criminals.”