MELITOPOL, April 12. /TASS/. Several dozens of volunteers from the Baltic states are taking part in the special military operation on the side of Russia in the Zaporozhye Region, Vladimir Rogov, leader of the We Are Together With Russia movement, told TASS on Wednesday.
"The number of volunteers from the Baltic republics only in the Zaporozhye direction amounts to dozens of fighters, the leaders [in numbers] are Lithuanians. Strange as it may seem, in most cases they are not [ethnic] Russians, but rather Latvians, Estonians, and Lithuanians," he said.
According to Rogov, these special military operation participants expect to obtain Russian citizenship because they fear persecution in their own countries. "They want to live in an adequate world where their peoples will have a chance to continue as peoples. Most often they are traditionalists, people who are determined to preserve a normal family and their national identity. <...> All of them want to get Russian citizenship, knowing that if their personal data is leaked, they will face long-term imprisonment or extrajudicial execution in their homeland," he said.
In early March, the acting governor of the Zaporozhye Region, Yevgeny Balitsky, announced that Serbian volunteers who were fighting on the side of Russia in the Pavel Sudoplatov volunteer battalion would be able to obtain Russian citizenship. In an earlier interview published by Politico, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said that Serbs who went to fight in the special military operation zone would be arrested when they return to Serbia.