He better eat your passport abroad

Lukashenko found a “elegant” way to avenge Belarusians who escaped from his regime: all documents can now be changed only within the country. People are horrified

Belarusians abroad will now not be able to change passports, make real estate transactions and receive a number of documents without personal presence in their country.

The corresponding decrees come into force on September 7. Decree No. 278 “On the procedure for issuing documents and the commission of actions” and amendments to decree No. 294 “On documenting the population of the Republic of Belarus” will not allow citizens permanently residing outside Belarus, not only to make a number of transactions with a power of attorney formalized in Belarus itself, but also to receive and change the passport. The latter is issued to citizens for ten years and is a universal document both within the country and abroad. In what problems that the Belarusians will be faced with, whether new measures will be forced to return back and what alternatives to those who have already expired, the correspondent of Novaya Gazeta Europe understood.

"Everything, documents are no longer accepted"

“When they wrote in the news that the decree was published, I sobbed half an hour,” says Nastya (the name was changed at the request of the heroine) .

Nastya is 34 years old, since 2021 she lives in Lithuania. The validity of her passport expires in April next year, and a residence permit in January.

“They told me: change your passport, and then we will then extend you a residence permit,” she says. - I started calling the Belarusian embassy in May this year, they told me: there are no records yet, call in early June. In early summer, I called, and I was recorded only on September 11th. On September 5, when news about the decree appeared, I called the embassy.

I was told that so far there are no orders, but as soon as the decree is published, they will immediately enter into force, and the documents simply will not accept me. The 6th I called again-they told me that everything, the documents are no longer accepted.

According to the commentary of the press service of the Belarusian Foreign Ministry, Decree No. 278 (“On the procedure for issuing documents and the commission”) and amendments to Decree No. 294 (“On documenting the population of the Republic of Belarus”), prohibiting consulates for accepting passports, as well as issue important certificates and power of attorney, will enter into force on September 7. Those citizens of Belarus who live in another country and are going to change their passports, as well as issue an apostili and power of attorney, will have to come to the country and apply at the place of registration.

Those who managed to submit applications for new passports before the entry into force of this Decree must receive them.

- For the extension of the passport, I went to Georgia a few months ago: literally in mid -August I paid the fee, took photos and now I'm waiting for a new one. In theory, they should be issued until October, ”says Marina who left Belarus.

She left at the end of March this year. Swiftly, in one day she collected a suitcase and arrived in Tbilisi. The reason, as she notes, is “classic Belarusian”: friends called, they said that a friend was detained, and on his phone they discovered a impossible photo from protests. In this photo there was Marina.

“I'm afraid to come back: I also have the likelihood of sitting down,” she says. - I left absolutely without preparation: I did not translate the documents, did not make a power of attorney, even forgot about the fact that the passport is expired - it has expired in May. To go to the Embassy of Belarus in Georgia, there are grounds for staying in this country, at least a rental agreement. And I lived on my friends here, so the basis was urgently made by the IP.

To understand how Belarusians who left their country for various reasons, in most cases by political, react to a new decree, it is enough to read comments under the corresponding news. People are divided into those who managed to put in order all the documents, get other grounds for living (for example, citizenship of another country) and are not going to return back, and those who do not yet have such grounds, because a residence permit or permanent residence is not an alternative to a passport.

“When I read about it, I had a fierce, sorry, Ahui,” says Marina. - This is the real iron curtain. It seems that quite expected, but still ... There are a lot of Belarusians who went abroad, and very many in the near future will face this situation with a passport: few people want to return or pay fines to the state, which with fear and force drove you out of the house.

I just heard such a story already: a person was not given a passport because of problems with the law, they demanded to pay some considerable fine. In 2020, he was a participant in protests, like many.

“I'm afraid to come to Belarus: after all these news, I presented how I flew and stand at the Minsk airport, and my stomach just twisted with fear,” another Belarusian Anastasia admits.

Together with her husband and mother, immediately after the outbreak of war, she left for Albania. With legalization, it turned out to be more complicated than it looked from the outside. It took almost six months to make a residence permit, but its validity expires in mid -December. To extend the residence permit, Anastasia planned to redo the passport: it ends in August next year, but for a residence permit, which is issued for a year, according to her, a passport with a longer validity period is needed.

“There is no Belarus consulate in Albania, so I planned to go to Serbia,” says Anastasia. - In Belgrade is the nearest, and there are no such queues as in Poland or Lithuania: you can sign up in just a week. Now I don't know what to do. I sent them a letter with questions. After all, there is not only the political reason why a person cannot come. But also medical, financial ...

"The passport will need to go to Minsk"

“Today, the emigrated Belarusians learned that now they could only change the passport in Belarus. I learned about this amazing initiative exactly a year ago, when I came to the consulate for a certificate of disgust, ”writes writer and journalist Sasha Filipenko on his Facebook page.

In a conversation with the New Evrope, he calls what is happening "small children's revenge from his grandfather." Sasha left Belarus in 2020, immediately after the protests, due to the threat of arrest: in periodically appearing propaganda notes they often write about the fact that for Filipenko a period of 12 years has already been “reserved”.

Now Filipenko lives in Switzerland and does not leave for the territory of the European Union: free pages for stamps and visas have ended in the passport.

“I have an average of 50-60 performances a year in Europe with my various books,” he says. “Here I can travel, since I just have enough residence permit.” But I can’t leave somewhere. Now my book has been transferred to Japanese and Thai, but I can’t go either to Japan or Thailand simply because I have nowhere to glorify visas.

A year ago, Sasha tried to remake a passport. When he came for a certificate for a residence permit, the consulate is to the question if he could change his passport, he was answered: “You can even very much! The only thing is Alexander ... In your case, you will need to go to Minsk for a passport. ”

To see in Minsk “fugitives”, as the propaganda publication “Belarus today” calls them, those who support this decree are clearly really wanting:

“Homeland missed. The homeland was generous, merciful and patient, but now he wants to look into the eyes of those who received citizenship here. Whoever built houses and cottages here, who bought cars and beauty salons here, who was educated there, who raised and treated children nearby. And who then decided to shake the redhead from boredom and satiety. And then who then hid and ran away ”( spelling and punctuation are preserved. - Approx. Ed. ) . - It is difficult to understand the logic of these people, but I think that the measures taken are due simply: why spend money on traitors? - comments Filipenko’s decree. -In general, it seems that this is due to big financial problems. When you get the same certificate of disgust at the consulate, they can send it to you at the place of registration. So they have no money that they sent me to the mail, where I had to buy an envelope and brand for one frank. And then they sent me a certificate - in my envelope.

"The year of the Chalice without a Pashpart LIVE"

After signing the new decree, the leader of the Belarusian opposition Svetlana Tikhanovskaya said that she and her colleagues are currently negotiating with the governments of the countries where Belarusians live on alternative documents. The question of the so -called passport of the New Belarus will be raised at the UN General Assembly, which will be held in September.

“On September 4, I would express a skepticism about the possibility of implementing this idea, but after September 4, I admit that Svetlana Tikhanovskaya can listen to the words and ideas in European countries,” says Olen Yurkin, head of the legal department of Free Belarus Center.

One of the options for Belarusians in Poland and Lithuania The lawyer sees the design of a travel document for foreigners (Alien's Passport). This document is officially the temporary replacement of personality certificates and is issued to people without citizenship and foreigners. If the national passport was lost or damaged, and it is not possible to obtain a new one, then the travel document will allow a person to calmly move between the countries that signed an agreement on the recognition of such a travel document.

“This document is definitely enough for traveling around the European Union,” says another Belarusian Lisa.

Lisa is 28 years old. After the news of the decree, she published Storis on her Instagram with a signature in Belarusian: "A year of a chalave without a pashparte zhlye." For almost a year, she really has been living, working and studying in Poland without a national passport.

“I have expired in November last year,” she says. - After 2020, I left: first to Odessa, and then to Poland. I thought that I could still return to Belarus and change my passport, but I did not think that such an iron curtain would fall. In the summer of 2022, I called the consulate in Poland: they told me that a replacement record was possible only six months later. I wrote letters to the mail, and they gave me very conflicting information:

Some consulates said that a passport with an already expired validity period I could never change, while others answered that you can change, but wait a long time.

I did not know that it would be in six months: maybe going to the consulates would be simply unsafe. Then I learned about the fact that I can go to the Polish travel document for a foreigner ( Polski DokUpt Podróży Dla Cudzoziemca. - Approx. Ed. ) , And I went to it.

Since July 1, 2023, Poland introduced for Belarusians a simplified filing system for a travel document: now it is not necessary to pay a state fee, as well as prove the fact of political persecution in Belarus or the inability to issue a passport in any other way.

“The Polish authorities seemed to know something and this summer just expanded the norm adopted at the beginning of the year,” explains these changes to Olen Yurkin. - Belarusians who have a residence permit on various grounds, and not only by humanitarian, will be able to simplify this document.

Earlier, Poland also gave Belarusians with a humanitarian visa the opportunity to arrange a residence permit for three years (in many countries it is issued for a year) and live and work on it.

Obtaining a Polish travel document for a foreigner is possible on the basis of an identity document. As a rule, this is just a residence permit. That is, a person who has appeared in the country on any other grounds with an invalid passport, most likely, will need to be supplied to refugee. Olena Yurkina notes that the conditions for obtaining a refugee status in each country are very different:

- In the same Germany, refugee status, as far as I know, receive an average of two years, and all this time you can not work. In Poland, this is faster, but in countries outside the EU the situation will be difficult, ”she predicts. - We have Belarusians who turn to us for help with documents from Ukraine. And if these are one and a half years, after February 24, they could at least solve their problems with documents, either going to visa -free countries, such as Moldova, or by contacting consulates in Poland, now everything has become very bad.

Anastasia notes the lack of a single system that allows you to solve problems with passports for Belarusians outside the EU zone: in Albania there are no special programs for those who have left for now.

“The headquarters of Tikhanovskaya now plans to create a new“ Nansen passport ”, but I don’t really believe in it,” she admits sadly. - Even if everything works out, I'm not sure that many countries with this passport will joyfully accept us. In the best case, he will act on the territory of Poland and Lithuania.

"The country refuses you"

In addition to the inability to replace or extend the passport in foreign consulates, after publishing a new decree, Belarusians will also not be able to sell real estate and cars in Belarus, receive various documents and certificates - from a duplicate of birth certificate to a certificate from the registry office that a person is not married. The latter is necessary, for example, for marriage in a foreign state. Also, it will not be possible to get duplicates of a diploma or certificate or put an apostille on the documents.

For all this, a personal presence or power of attorney for a representative, formalized in Belarus itself, will now be required.

Thus, according to the decree, by previously issued powers of attorney in foreign consulates, all these actions will not be possible to perform as before.

- We have an apartment in Belarus. If you discard the entire emotional component, it would be rational to sell it now, and make money for a mortgage as a first pledge here, ”says Roman. Since the beginning of 2022, his family has been living in Poland. - But the daughter is still registered in the apartment, and, as far as I know, the child will also not be discharged from the apartment without his immediate physical presence there. I have a power of attorney for mother -in -law, and formed in Belarus. But we cannot just transfer the three -year -old daughter there: you need to go with her. Our family does not have a play on the border, so the apartment is just renting.

Lawyer Olena Yurkina believes that some operations, despite the new decree, can still try to resolve remotely, but the guarantee, how much it will work, is difficult:

- You can try to contact a legal representative in Belarus, a lawyer, remotely conclude an agreement with him and try to receive documents on the warrant through him. In theory, the same certificate of divorce can be obtained through it.

Olena emphasizes that even bypass pathways will not solve all problems. So far, it is impossible to realize the consequences of this solution, but one thing is clear: people have a lot of life very much.

“In general, it is a decision rather organic for dictator Lukashenko so that every Belarusian is determined: he is in his own country or somewhere else,” Olena says. - Here are those who are in the country, can sell cars and apartments, change passports. And let everyone else get out as they can.

- In fact, the country refuses you at the official level. And it hurts very much, ”concludes Belarusian Alexei. Unlike many who are now faced with the problem of replacing passports, he has a situation, as he himself admits, a little better: he made a power of attorney before leaving in 2021, is not going to sell the apartment, and the passport is valid until 2026. “But I think about what I will do after its completion, because the residence permit is tied to the validity of the passport.” If in Germany, where I am now I am, they will nevertheless accept the law on simplified receipt of citizenship after five years in the country, then in 2026 I can only go under such a program. In the best case, the whole process will take a year: by that time, the passport will be invalid, and I will definitely face a number of bureaucratic problems. In fact, I will remain such an incomprehensible citizen of the world. Without a passport.