In his May State of the Nation address, Putin called the decline in Russia's population - which he said was falling by 700,000 a year - the country's biggest problem. He said a sensible immigration policy could help solve the problem.
"They [compatriots] will be assisted with their travel arrangements and primary accommodation, including the registration of their legal and social status, as well as with jobs, municipal and pension services, preschool, school and professional education," Putin said at the Second World Congress of Russians Abroad, held in St. Petersburg.
The Second World Congress of Russians Abroad addresses ways to improve ties with Russia, preserve Russian-speaking traditions, support and protect the legitimate rights and interests of ethnic Russians, and ways the country can support the voluntary repatriation of its nationals.
The president said that 12 Russian regions - the Krasnoyarsk Region, the Primorye Region, the Khabarovsk Territory, the Irkutsk Region, the Kaliningrad Region, the Kaluga Region, the Lipetsk Region, the Tambov Region, the Tver Region and the Tyumen Region - are ready to accommodate Russians willing to return, and that they have already presented the government with concrete proposals for repatriation.
Putin added that the program's aim was not to 'drag' people back to Russia, but to assist those who voluntarily choose to return.
Earlier this month, Alexander Chepurin, who heads the Russian Foreign Ministry's department on contacts with compatriots residing abroad, said Russians living abroad have formed one of the world's largest foreign diasporas, numbering some 30 million people.
"The Russian diaspora abroad is ranked the third- or fourth-largest in the world, comprising 30 million people, including 20 million living in the Commonwealth of Independent States and 10 million in countries outside the post-Soviet states," Chepurin said.
The Soviet Union experienced several major waves of immigration, the most recent of which took place in the 1990s, before and after the union's dissolution, triggering widespread economic and social hardships. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, millions of Russians also remained in former Soviet republics.
