Klishas called on the Foreign Ministry to mirror the “discrimination” of Russians in the EU

Earlier, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs reported that a number of EU countries put forward obviously impossible conditions for obtaining entry permits for Russians.Klishas urged the ministry to take a "clear position" and respond to the discrediting of the Russians in a mirror

After the Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced that the EU countries require Russians to comply with impossible requirements when applying for visas, the ministry needs to take a “clear position” and mirror the discriminatory policy of the European Union. Andrei Klishas, ​​the HEAD of the Committee on Constitutional Legislation and State Construction of the Federation Council, wrote about this in his TELEGRAM channel.

Earlier, Deputy Foreign Minister of RUSSIA Yevgeny Ivanov said that a number of EU countries are putting forward obviously impracticable conditions for obtaining entry permits for Russians.

“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs states that the EU countries, when applying for visas, require our citizens to comply with impossible requirements. Obviously, this is evidence of discrimination and treatment of Russians as second-class people, such a policy of Western countries has been carried out for several days, and we still cannot get a clear position from our Foreign Ministry - what kind of response Russia is ready to take in relation to these countries in a response to open discrimination,” Klishas said.

In his opinion, the Foreign Ministry needs to mirror the Western restrictions and make sure that the rules for issuing Russian visas to foreign citizens "contain the same (up to impossible) set of requirements." “We need to move from words and fruitless regrets in this area to tough response actions - this is the only way to protect the rights of Russians,” the senator emphasized.

The Foreign Ministry announced the impracticable visa requirements for Russian tourists in the EU Politics

After the start of the Russian special operation in Ukraine, several European countries suspended the issuance of Schengen visas to Russians. In particular, Finland, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia and Poland did so. In addition, the European Union has suspended the simplified visa regime with Russia since September 12. The fee has increased from €35 to €80, the period for reviewing applications has increased from 15 to 45 days, and tourists have decided to give low priority when considering (they may also request additional documents).

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Commenting on the discussion of a possible complete ban on the issuance of Schengen visas to Russians, the press secretary of the President of Russia Dmitry Peskov expressed the hope that "opponents will retain at least a small amount of sober thinking." If the measures are nevertheless introduced, Russia will respond to them, he added.

Before the pandemic, Russians were in the lead among citizens of the states to which the EU countries issued the most Schengen visas (such a visa gives the right to free movement in all countries of the Schengen agreement, which includes the main European countries). In 2019, about 4 million such visas were issued to Russian citizens. For comparison, Chinese citizens have received about a million visas to travel to the EU, according to data from the European Commission. As of September 1, 2022, about 963 thousand Russians had valid Schengen visas.