The Baltic countries and Poland will seek separate solutions to limit the flow of Russian travellers, Lithuania’s foreign minister said after the European Union came short of ending tourist visas for Russian nationals.
Instead, the EU will scrap a facilitated regime for Russians, making it harder to obtain Schengen visas.
Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis said in a press release after an informal meeting of the bloc’s top diplomats in Prague on Wednesday that “we succeeded in convincing all EU countries that millions of Russian citizens with Schengen visas are a problem not only for the countries bordering Russia, but also for the EU’s regional security”.
“Together with Estonia, Latvia and Poland, we will work in the coming weeks to find solutions that will help us significantly limit the flow of Russian tourists,” he said.
EU foreign ministers agreed earlier on Wednesday to suspend a 2007 visa facilitation agreement with Russia.
The measure does not mean a formal ban on tourist visas as requested by Lithuania and some other countries bordering Russia.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the suspension of the deal will make it “more difficult” for Russian nationals to obtain visas.
Lithuanian President Gitanas Nausėda said the solution was a “half-measure” among member states and “a prelude to more decisive steps”.
“It is, to put it mildly, a half-measure, a compromise, and I would see it only as a prelude to stronger and more decisive steps with regard to Russia,” he told reporters on Wednesday.
Nausėda said Europe is changing and “is increasingly listening to those countries that have a firm position on Russia”, adding that he expects the bloc to find a consensus on harsher visa restrictions.
“I find it hard to imagine today that the Kremlin clique would be able to wage a war in Ukraine as if nothing had happened, if the Russian public did not support it and openly opposed it. This would probably be impossible,” he said.
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