We would like to draw your attention to considerable changes in the migration legislation of the Russian Federation which will come into force as of February 15, 2011. Changes will affect the category of highly qualified foreign specialists and their family members, as well as migration registration / de-registration procedure for all foreign nationals.

The most fundamental changes refer to procedures of migration documents processing for highly qualified foreign specialists.

1. Definition of the category of highly qualified foreign specialist and accompanying family members:

   First of all, it should be mentioned that the new law amends the definition of the category itself: thus before the minimum annual salary amount defined for this category was 2 mln rubles, now this category will also include foreign nationals with annual salary no less than 1 mln rubles provided that a foreign national is a scientist or a teacher invited to Russia by state / accredited by state higher education institutions, academy of sciences, research and / or scientific centers to participate in research and / or teaching, and foreign nationals participating in ?Skolkovo? project (no matter of salary amount). Whereby the law prohibits processing of work permits under the category of highly qualified specialists for foreign nationals working in retail business area and practicing a religion (no matter of salary amount).

   The category of accompanying family members when applicable to highly qualified specialists has been widened to include spouse and children (standard definition) as well as children?s spouses, parents (including adoptive parents), parents? spouses, grandparents and grandchildren.

2. Migration registration of highly qualified foreign specialists and accompanying family members:

   There will be no need for highly qualified specialists of any category to have migration registration for stay less than 90 days. At the same time, such a foreign national registered in Russia and rotating within the territory of the Russian Federation should not get registered at a new place if his / her stay in such a place does not exceed 30 days. Upon expiry of 90 (30) days a highly qualified foreign specialist should get registered in accordance with the general rules within three working days.

3. Employer?s obligations to highly qualified foreign specialists and accompanying family members:

   The new legislation also defines the term of reports that should be filed with the Federal Migration Service of the Russian Federation with respect to salary paid to highly qualified specialists: as opposed to pure indication of reporting frequency stipulated by the initial law (quarterly reporting), now it provides the deadline as well which is the last day of the month following the reporting period. Apart that, the law stipulates the possibility for the employer to sign a contract with a medical institution for medical assistance to a highly qualified specialist and his / her accompanying family members along with provision of medical insurance as one of the obligatory requirements for initial processing / extension of the work permit.

4. Migration registration / de-registration of all categories of foreign nationals:

   We would also like to mention changes affecting the registration / de-registration rules applicable to all foreign nationals. Thus, from now on the migration registration will be possible only at the address of foreign national?s actual residence, and not at the employer?s location address (currently both options have been stipulated by the legislation).

   De-registration will be carried out by migration authorities on their own, thus in cases of: registration at a new place of residence ? data on the new place will be transferred to migration authorities by migration authorities of another region; foreign national?s departure from Russia ? border officials should notify the migration authorities accordingly.

   It is evident that the most of part of the changes will have positive impact on foreign nationals? stay on the territory of the Russian Federation, in many ways facilitating procedures of entrance and stay of highly qualified foreign specialists and their family members. However at this stage it is difficult to predict how efficient and successful these changes will be put into practice.

We will try to provide you with more details of new registration rules as they are likely to affect the majority of employers hiring foreign nationals.