vlad.tribnet.com / Issue #158 / Special reports / Reading article...

Dealing with passports and visa registration may drive both Russians and foreigners crazy. But Nikolai Romanov, the head of Primorye Department for Visas and Registration (OVIR) takes seriously the job of registering the population.

“It is not because we are tedious bureaucrats,” he said, “but if an old woman appeals to us, saying, ‘Please, find my son,’ we would be able to help her.”

Last month 118 local employees of OVIR celebrated the organization’s 65th anniversary. The job has changed significantly over the years. Until early 1992, when Vladivostok opened up, OVIR gave permission to the citizens of the former Soviet Union to come to the city, and it gave out passports to 16 year olds and women who married and changed their last name.

These days OVIR’s biggest problem is dealing with citizens of the former Soviet republics who move here. Romanov said in the absence of clear legislation, he has to make important decisions, especially when Russians are concerned.

Recently, a 40-year-old woman from Ussurisk married a military man. This man retired and took her to his homeland of Byelorussia, where she had to file for Byelorussian citizenship. There he became addicted to alcohol, and she left him. Coming back to Primorye to her mother and sister became an ordeal: She had to get legal permission to stay here. Had Romanov been merciless, he says, he could have sent her to Byelorussian embassy in Moscow, then to the Byelorussian town where she lived, in order to get the proper papers. But he permitted her to stay. “She had this personal failure, and we did not want to exacerbate it,” Romanov said. In 1997, the local OVIR office restored more than 1,700 Russian citizenships.

There is no Russian legislation governing foreigners’ stay in the country, only presidential decrees. OVIR is responsible for registering within three days all foreigners who arrive. The office can also issue visas to tourists and students or other foreigners in emergencies.

During the first six months of 1997, 12,155 foreigners came to Khabarovsk, and 23,000 to Primorye.About 9,000 illegal Chinese were evicted last year from Primorye.

Russians have started to travel more, and OVIR provides them with passports. During the first six months of 1997, 26,000 foreign passports were issued in Primorye and 9,900 in Khabarovsk. The number of emigrants from Primorye grows. Six years ago there were 100, while in 1997 there were 550.