MOSCOW — The butcher is breaking spare ribs with an ax across the aisle and Bafo Zhamurov, a speck of a man in a cavernous market, is convinced he'll be selling his dried apricots here for a long time.
But the fruit stand vendor from Tajikistan faces a threat from a new government regulation that forbids shops and market stalls to hire foreigners after April 1. It is the latest attempt by a Russia echoing with preelection populist rhetoric and nationalist zeal to stem an illegal migrant population estimated at 10 million.
Zhamurov is like thousands of immigrants: a single man from a former Soviet state trying to make the living here that he can't make at home. He smiles, a nervous vendor in a tenuous job, speaking in contradictions over bins of nuts and sacks of snow-dusted fruit. Other illegal migrants wander the streets in disguise, carrying shovels and wearing orange overalls to avoid deportation by falsely suggesting they are public employees.
"We don't feel harassment or hatred by the Russians," Zhamurov said. "But certainly, these days the police are stopping us more and checking our documents. You can look around the market now. It's emptier than it used to be. Many of the traders have already started traveling back to their native countries."
Passions over illegal immigration have grown in recent years, notably from increasing numbers of Chinese and Vietnamese moving into eastern Russia. The new law was inspired in October when President Vladimir V. Putin called on parliament to "protect the native population" working in fruit and vegetable markets, where at least 45% of workers are immigrants.
"It's obvious that with 6.5 million jobless Russians, there is no need to have foreign market traders here," said Alexander Belov, leader of the Movement Against Illegal Immigration. "The attitude of Muscovites toward nonresident aliens can be characterized by two Russian words: \o7ponayekhali \f7[they came in large numbers] and \o7dostali \f7[we are sick and tired of them]."
Beginning this year, foreigners were denied jobs in shops selling alcohol and pharmaceuticals.
The new regulations also cut by 40% the number of immigrants employed in markets; by April 1, all foreigners without residency permits will be locked out of such jobs. Hundreds of thousands of Chinese and other Asian vendors have reportedly left the east, and Moscow's markets have noticeably thinned.
