Brits have already signed up for Vladimir Putin‘s offer to escape the woke West and move to Russia for its traditional values, reports in the country claim.
Already 17 people have been in touch with Russian diplomats in Britain seeking details of Putin’s fast-track residence permits, Moscow has said.
It comes after Putin changed immigration laws to tempt Westerners to embrace his dictatorship.
The aim is to save them from ‘destructive neoliberal ideological attitudes’ in the West.
Putin believes he is offering ‘humanitarian aid’ to people ‘who share traditional Russian spiritual and moral values’.
Americans Leo Lionel and Chantel Felice Haer have already moved to Russia along with their children, aged 16, 14, and 11
Putin has rewritten immigration laws in a new decree to tempt Westerners to embrace his dictatorship
Canadian Arend Feinstra with his wife (pictured), left the Canadian province of Ontario and moved to Russia with their eight children to start farming there
All 17 applied in the ten days after Putin’s announcement via Russia’s consulate-general in Edinburgh, according to the Kremlin-run Mash media outlet.
There is as yet no separate figure for the Russian embassy in London.
‘In the West, it seemed like they were just waiting for [Putin’s] document to appear – in the first 10 days alone, 17 citizens of Foggy Albion [Britain] wanted to move to us,’ reported Kremlin-loyal Tsargrad TV.
‘Tired of the liberal agenda – that’s how everyone who contacted the Russian diplomatic mission explained their decision.’
Putin is waiving immigration quotas and the need for language exams for ‘anti-wokers’ seeking refuge in Russia.
However, it is unclear if men accepted by Russia could later end up being pressured to fight in Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
Russia paved the way for the new scheme by allowing entry to Americans Leo Lionel and Chantel Felice Haer along with their children, aged 16, 14, and 11.
‘Personally I want to thank your President Putin for allowing Russia to become a good place for families in this world climate,’ he said.
‘We intend to use this opportunity to benefit our family.
‘I feel like I’ve been put in an arch of safety. And it’s very important. Thank you so much.’
All 17 applied in the ten days after Putin’s announcement via Russia’s consulate-general in Edinburgh (pictured), according to the Kremlin-run Mash media outlet
‘I just want to say that I feel very honoured,’ said his wife.
‘It feels like I just got married to Russia, and I look forward to building a future here with my family.’
Major-General Irina Volk of the Russian Interior Ministry said: ‘The desire to move to Russia for permanent residence arose against the background of the abolition of traditional moral and family values in American society, as well as the low level of education.’
Another couple, Canadian Arend Feinstra with his wife, left the Canadian province of Ontario and moved to Russia with their eight children.
‘We didn’t feel safe with our children there and for the future,’ he said.
‘There’s a lot of left-wing ideology, LGBTQ, trans, just a lot of things that we don’t agree with they teach there now.
‘We wanted to get away from that for our children.
‘But also, for economic reasons, the farming has better opportunities. We felt that Russia was best.’
Pro-Putin MP Maria Butina told Russians there was a ‘liberal dictatorship’ in the West.
‘It is important to emphasise that the peoples of these countries are not our enemies, but their governments, who have gone mad, are insane, and are imposing such policies,’ she said.
Pictured: Major General Irina Volk, spokesperson of the Russian Interior Ministry
‘It gets to the point – for example, in Germany….that if your child comes to school and says that he does not support all these same-sex unions, then he is taken away and sent for re-education’.
She said many Westerners ‘would like to connect their future with Russia precisely because we have the opportunity for freedom and a traditional way of life.
‘And these are not necessarily farmers, many of them are representatives of academic circles, teachers, doctors, teachers.
‘These are qualified personnel who decide to sell everything, come to Russia precisely because they have a sufficient level of intellectual development, education and spiritual development to understand that if you stay in your countries, you can lose your children, lose your family’.
Butina, 35, was previously jailed in the US on the espionage charge of ‘conspiring to work for a foreign government’.
Now an MP for the pro-Putin United Russia party, she was arrested in the United States in July 2018 and sentenced to 18 months in prison.
She pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to act as a foreign agent.
Butina was convicted of seeking to infiltrate conservative groups in the US including the National Rifle Association.
She was deported to Russia October 2019 after her sentence was slightly reduced for good behaviour.
