Russians’ Visas to Europe are planned to be cancelled in 2014

Visas for short trips for citizens of the Russian Federation and the European Union may be canceled in accordance with an agreement between Russia and the EU, which is scheduled to conclude in 2014.

This was announced by Russian Ambassador-at-Large to the EU Anvar Azimov in an interview with Interfax.

Anvar Azimov said that at the summit Russia-EU in December in Brussels the Russian party will stress its willingness to carry out all necessary work to facilitate the signing of the visa abolition agreement in the shortest possible time, in order to proceed development of this agreement in the second half of next year.

"We believe that the EU will find an adequate solution that will allow us to sign a draft of the new EU-Russia visa facilitation agreement in the near future. This agreement will provide certain benefits for the different categories of citizens, businessmen, journalists, and sportsmen, representatives of the academic and NGO communities. That means it will be possible to get 5 year visa for these categories" said AnvarAzimov.

Visa facilitation questions are discussing and there is a slow progress in solving them. The agreement between the U.S. and Russia on simplifying visa formalities came into force on September 9, 2012. According to the agreement, three-year visas will be issued to allow Russian and U.S. citizens to visit each other's country several times and stay for six months after the arrival. The Russian Federation will issue business, private, humanitarian and tourist visas on direct invitation of citizens and organizations, and the United States of America will issue «B1/B2» visas (business / tourism). Visas will be issued within 15 calendar days from the application filing date.
Source: Atorus