Moscow’s Compatriots Program Unintentionally Leading to Formation and Growth of Ethnic Enclaves in Russian Federation

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 21 – Twenty years ago this month, Putin established a program for the resettlement of ethnic Russians and other Russian speakers in the Russian Federation. As a result, 1.2 million people have arrived, but many aren’t ethnic Russians – and they are now contributing to the rise of ethnic enclaves, critics of the program say.

            The program was adopted in 2006 in order to compensate for the demographic decline of ethnic Russians in the first decade of this century after the relatively large-scal returns of ethnic Russians from the former Soviet space had ended in the decade before  (ritmeurasia.ru/news--2026-06-21--20-let-programme-pereselenija-sootechestvennikov-naskolko-ona-okazalas-effektivnoj-88501).

            But it has not worked entirely as intended, Rhythm of Eurasia says. The overwhelming majority of ethnic Russians who lived in the other Soviet republics in 1989 still live in what are now independent countries, and Moscow’s efforts to have them specifically return have been far less successful in percentage terms than have Astana’s to facilitate the return of ethnic Kazakhs.

            Most of the returnees are from five republics of the former USSR, the portal says, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Armenia. The inclusion of Tajikistan and Armenia on this list highlights something Moscow prefers to ignore: a large share of the compatriots returning to Russia aren’t ethnic Russians.

            There were only 68,200 ethnic Russians in Tajikistan in 2000 and only 14,600 ethnic Russians in Armenia in 2001. Consequently, “the intake from these countries could only occur through the participation of representatives of their titular ethnoses,” Tajiks and Armenians, something that has led to the appearance of growth of enclaves in Russia.

            Equally serious is the fact that the compatriots program which has been promoted as a way to increase the share of ethnic Russians in the Russian Federation population or at least limit the decline of this metric is not having the intended effect but instead is contributing on its own to the mounting migration crisis there.