Ukraine’s president-elect offers passports to Russians

KIEV: President-elect Volodymyr Zelensky dismissed an offer by Vladimir Putin to provide passports to Ukrainians, and pledged instead to grant citizenship to Russians who "suffer" under the Kremlin’s rule.

The Russian president on Saturday said Moscow was considering plans to make it easier for all Ukrainians to obtain Russian citizenship, after it earlier moved to grant passports in the country’s separatist east.

Kiev has been fighting Moscow-backed rebels in eastern Ukraine since 2014 in a war that has killed 13,000. Zelensky, a comedian who won Ukraine’s presidential election last week, responded to Putin’s offer by releasing a statement on Facebook late on Saturday.

"We know perfectly well what a Russian passport provides," he said, listing "the right to be arrested for a peaceful protest" and "the right not to have free and competitive elections." He pledged instead to "give citizenship to representatives of all nations that suffer from authoritarian and corrupt regimes.

"But first and foremost to the Russian people who suffer most of all". He said that one of the differences between Ukraine and Russia is that "we Ukrainians have freedom of speech, freedom of the media and the internet in our country." A political novice, Zelensky has pledged to "reboot" peace talks with the separatists that also involve Russia and the West.