Italian journalist Lucidi was granted Russian citizenship

Italian journalist Andrea Lucidi has become a citizen of the Russian Federation. This was announced by the official representative of the Russian Interior Ministry Irina Volk on January 29.

"Another foreigner became a citizen of our country, choosing it for further residence. This is a war correspondent from Italy Andrea Lucidi," she wrote in Telegram-channel.

The Russian passport was issued to the Italian in the Migration Department of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia in the Voronezh region. The management of the police department for the city of Voronezh issued the document after he took the oath of a Russian citizen.

"At a time when European Union countries turn their backs on the truth and call me a propagandist, Russia opens all doors for me and accepts me into its friendly multinational family," - noted Luchidi.

Volk said that after graduating from St. Petersburg State University, he devoted himself to journalism and began covering the special military operation in Ukraine. She added that the Italian visited all new regions of the Russian Federation.

In the summer of 2024, he moved with his family to Voronezh, where he received a residence permit, the official representative of the Russian Interior Ministry specified.

Lucidi asked Russian President Vladimir Putin to grant him Russian citizenship due to persecution in his home country on November 10 last year.

On November 11, an Italian journalist reported on the atrocities of the Ukrainian military in the SVO zone. The reporter said that he had seen locals in Mariupol crying while talking about shelling by Azov militants (recognized as a terrorist organization and banned in Russia). According to the journalist, it has always angered him that Ukraine and the West deny the existence of Kiev's neo-Nazism.

The special operation to protect Donbass, the start of which was announced by Russia on February 24, 2022, continues. The decision was taken against the backdrop of the worsening situation in the region.