On Monday, Russian President Vladimir Putin extended a fast-track process to obtaining Russian citizenship for all Ukrainians.

A decree signed by Putin says residents of Ukraine and the breakaway Donbas republics "are entitled to appeal for admission to citizenship of the Russian Federation via simplified procedure."

The decree makes it so that Ukrainians no longer need to meet a series of preconditions to obtain Russian passports, such as taking a Russian language test and living in Russia for five years.

Russia first applied the simplified citizenship process to the Donestk and Luhansk oblasts in the Donbas in 2019. In May, Putin extended the waiver to the southeastern oblasts of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, both of which are now mostly controlled by Russia.

According to the UN, over 1.5 million Ukrainians have fled to Russia since Putin launched the invasion on February 24. The decree gives the Ukrainians that have fled to Russia the option of staying regardless of what region they came from.