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Putin dismisses idea of deportation as punishment for foreign nationals

This proposal was earlier voiced by Chairman of the Presidential Council for Civil Society and Human Rights Mikhail Fedotov

MOSCOW, December 11. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin has come out against the idea to envisage in the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation deportation to the homeland as punishment for minor offences committed by foreign nationals in Russia.

This proposal was voiced on Tuesday at a session of the Presidential Council for Civil Society and Human Rights by its Chairman Mikhail Fedotov.

"No, I am against this," Putin said. In this case, Russian and foreign nationals will find themselves in different conditions, he explained. "A Russian national may end up behind bars, while a foreign national will simply go home for one and the same crime," he explained.

He also drew attention to the fact that nationals from most countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States don’t need visas for travels to Russia. "Imagine he (a criminal) has been deported to his homeland, he boards a plane .... and lands in another city of the Russian Federation. He gets out and is free to go, the punishment is over," Putin cited an example.

Besides, he called inadmissible the situation in which dozens of people are inmates of one and the same prison cell.