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Poroshenko grants Ukrainian citizenship to Russia-born Odessa region deputy governor

Maria Gaidar was appointed deputy governor of Ukraine's Odessa region in mid-July by Georgian ex-president and the current governor of the Odessa region, Mikheil Saakashvili

Maria Gaidar and Petro Poroshenko Mykhailo Markiv/Press Office of the President of Ukraine/TASS

Maria Gaidar and Petro Poroshenko

© Mykhailo Markiv/Press Office of the President of Ukraine/TASS

KIEV, August 4. /TASS/. Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has granted Ukrainian citizenship to Odessa deputy governor Maria Gaidar, the Ukrainian government’s press service said on Tuesday.

"Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko signed a decree on granting citizenship and gave passports of Ukrainian citizens to public figure Maria Gaidar and Russian journalist, former editor-in-chief of Forbes Ukraina Vladimir Fedorin," the press service said.

Maria Gaidar was appointed deputy governor of Ukraine's Odessa region in mid-July by Georgian ex-president and the current governor of the Odessa region, Mikheil Saakashvili.

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According to Saakashvili, Maria Gaidar will be responsible for the social sphere. "She is an economist, she studied at the Academy of National Economy in Moscow and at Harvard University," he said.

"I knew her father Yegor Gaidar and respected him a lot. She moved to Odessa and will work at our administration. And we appeal to the Ukrainian president to grant her the Ukrainian citizenship," the Odessa region governor said back then.

Gaidar is the daughter of the late Egor Gaidar, a member of the government formed by Russia’s first president, Boris Yeltsin.

Maria Gaidar represents the so-called "non-systemic opposition" in Russia. She is the former vice-governor of Russia’s Kirov region.

Gaidar is an active participant in a number of liberal pro-Western movements in Russia. In 2011, she studied at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

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