Tens of thousands of Russians who fled to Turkey after Moscow's invasion of Ukraine have moved on to other countries in the last year, squeezed by residency issues and soaring costs, according to data and interviews, including with nine Russian citizensç
Reuters reports.
When the war began in February 2022, Turkey, Russia's Black Sea neighbour and a NATO member, emerged as a magnet for Russians, especially its largest city Istanbul and the Mediterranean resort of Antalya.
Some of them had opposed the invasion, others were trying to shield themselves and their businesses from a wave of Western sanctions imposed on Moscow, including travel bans on Russians to much of Europe. Some men feared being drafted into the army.
But this month, the number of Russians with Turkish resident permits fell to 96,000, down by more than a third from 154,000 at the end of 2022, official data shows.
Nine Russian citizens who spoke to Reuters said they and others had left partly due to struggles to get residence permits since early 2023. Many have headed to Serbia and Montenegro, among the few European countries where they are welcome.
Russians are also moving on because of soaring costs - Turkish inflation hit 70% last month - as well as difficulty doing basic banking in Turkey as a result of the sanctions.
"You can't predict your future in Turkey," said Dmitri, 46, an IT sector employee who declined to give his surname.
After President Vladimir Putin announced a mobilisation in September of 2022 to recruit Russian men to fight in Ukraine, Dmitri left St. Petersburg and reunited with his wife and four-year-old son in Istanbul.
But in January 2023, a text message appeared on his phone saying his residency application was rejected without explanation, he said. Dmitri left Istanbul a month later.
"I had signed a rental contract for one year but had to leave everything behind. We moved to Montenegro because it is economically and politically more stable than Turkey," he said.
Turkey's Presidency of Migration Management said all rejected resident-permit applications include a justification in the foreigners' own language under relevant laws, and that applicants are free to pursue legal remedies.
In an email, it said departures of Russians were not only linked to residency permits.
"Several political, economic and sociocultural factors play a role," the government agency said.
