Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a decree expanding a fast track to Russian citizenship to all citizens of Ukraine, a document published on the government’s website showed.

Until recently, only residents of the self-proclaimed breakaway territories of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) and Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR) in eastern Ukraine, which Russia seeks to “liberate” from Kyiv’s control, as well as the Russian-occupied regions of Kherson and Zaporizhia, were eligible for the simplified procedure.

Between 2019 – when the procedure was first introduced for the residents of Donetsk and Luhansk – and this year, more than 720,000 residents of the rebel-held areas in the two regions – about 18 percent of the population – have received Russian passports.

In late May this year, three months after Russia invaded Ukraine, the fast-track procedure was also offered to residents of the Zaporizhia and Kherson regions. A month ago, the first Russian passports were reportedly handed out there.