Visa restrictions for Russians going to Poland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania [merged threads]

[PakistaniRussian 83]

https://news.err.ee/1608709153/baltics-poland-to-ban-entry-to-russian-tourists-from-september-19

 

With the latest news, does this affect Russians who need to go the US Embassy for an interview for their K1 Visa? My fiancee is a Russia passport holder, but we both live in Turkey with Residence Permits. 

 

Right now, we had to get a Schengen visa for Spain and then travel to Poland for our interview (2023 Spring). Will Poland reject entry to Russian citizens? Or will the US transfer our case to a different country that Russian are able to visit?

 

Any advice or how to find out would be really appreciated.

[powerpuff 6,697]

If you have residence permits in Turkey, you should be able to transfer your case there.

 

29 minutes ago, PakistaniRussian said:

Right now, we had to get a Schengen visa for Spain and then travel to Poland for our interview (2023 Spring). Will Poland reject entry to Russian citizens?

They have no mechanism to enforce that. A schengen visa allows one to visit any country in the schengen zone and there are zero security checks so I don’t see how they’ll be able to restrict anyone from coming to Poland. So it’ll be interesting to see…

 

 

Edited September 8, 2022 by powerpuff

[PakistaniRussian 83]

14 minutes ago, powerpuff said:

If you have residence permits in Turkey, you should be able to transfer your case there.

 

They have no mechanism to enforce that. A schengen visa allows one to visit any country in the schengen zone and there are zero security checks so I don’t see how they’ll be able to restrict anyone from coming to Poland. So it’ll be interesting to see…

 

 

Thanks, we'll wait on approval. Once its sent to NVC, then we'll request a transfer to Istanbul if that's possible.

 

As far as the enforcement, yeah I'm not sure what's going to happen, so we'll just have to wait and see 

[powerpuff 6,697]

6 minutes ago, PakistaniRussian said:

Thanks, we'll wait on approval. Once its sent to NVC, then we'll request a transfer to Istanbul if that's possible.

 

As far as the enforcement, yeah I'm not sure what's going to happen, so we'll just have to wait and see 

Yes, it should be possible, attach a copy of the residence permit when you send the request. That will be done through the NVC public inquiry form. You will also want to reach out to NVC to find out your case number so you can combine the two inquiries together. They have wait timeframes on their website for when to expect an answer back. 
 

I believe the immigrant visa unit is in Ankara, that’s where your fiancé will have her interview at.

Edited September 8, 2022 by powerpuff

[Mike E 11,739]

26 minutes ago, powerpuff said:

 They have no mechanism to enforce that. A schengen visa allows one to visit any country in the schengen zone and there are zero security checks so I don’t see how they’ll be able to restrict anyone from coming to Poland. So it’ll be interesting to see…

 

 

Some with passports that lack a visa waiver for the Schengen Area might disagree. 
 

Case in point, the airline employee at the gate in Orly checked my wife’s passport for a Schengen visa before letting her board a flight to Greece. And on a bus trip from Frankfurt to the Netherlands, Dutch border police checked every rider’s passport and visa. 
 

During the outset of the migrant crisis in Europe, Germany brought back passport control for my flight from Athens. 
 

It might be air tight security checks but Poland can certainly add checks.   

[powerpuff 6,697]

5 minutes ago, Mike E said:

Some with passports that lack a visa waiver for the Schengen Area might disagree. 
 

Case in point, the airline employee at the gate in Orly checked my wife’s passport for a Schengen visa before letting her board a flight to Greece. And on a bus trip from Frankfurt to the Netherlands, Dutch border police checked every rider’s passport and visa. 
 

During the outset of the migrant crisis in Europe, Germany brought back passport control for my flight from Athens. 
 

It might be air tight security checks but Poland can certainly add checks.   

That will take a lot of manpower to check every bus, train, car and plane

[slavaskii 886]

6 hours ago, powerpuff said:

That will take a lot of manpower to check every bus, train, car and plane

Given the political position of PiS, I most definitely think they'll start doing it for trains and planes. It is questionable how reimplementing border checkpoints coincides with the Schengen regime, but if Germany brought them back for COVID, Poland has some strong precedent from exactly the country that would oppose them. And, in any case, Poland can certainly try to get away with it a few times before the Schengen Zone can figure out how to stop them. 

 

This is definitely a better discussion for the R/U/B subforum, though.

[powerpuff 6,697]

~~ Topic moved from K1 forum to Russia, Ukraine & Belarus as it’s region/country specific ~~
 

1 hour ago, slavaskii said:

Given the political position of PiS, I most definitely think they'll start doing it for trains and planes. It is questionable how reimplementing border checkpoints coincides with the Schengen regime, but if Germany brought them back for COVID, Poland has some strong precedent from exactly the country that would oppose them. And, in any case, Poland can certainly try to get away with it a few times before the Schengen Zone can figure out how to stop them. 

 

This is definitely a better discussion for the R/U/B subforum, though.

You’re right, I moved the topic to the RUB sub-forum.

 

Well, COVID was slightly different, it had no push-back from other EU member states. In this case, the move to ban Russian tourists from entry is not supported by a number of [key] member states (Germany/France). But on a bright side (?), I think this would mean that, eventually, the DOS has to designate a different consulate to process Russian applicants (hopefully with easier access). 

[slavaskii 886]

35 minutes ago, powerpuff said:

~~ Topic moved from K1 forum to Russia, Ukraine & Belarus as it’s region/country specific ~~
 

You’re right, I moved the topic to the RUB sub-forum.

 

Well, COVID was slightly different, it had no push-back from other EU member states. In this case, the move to ban Russian tourists from entry is not supported by a number of [key] member states (Germany/France). But on a bright side (?), I think this would mean that, eventually, the DOS has to designate a different consulate to process Russian applicants (hopefully with easier access). 

So this led me down a really fascinating rabbit hole when I should instead be making headway on my Law Review Note, lol. As expected, this 'question' of a Schengen country refusing to recognize visas issued by another Schengen state seems to be a novel one, so I turned to the Wikipedia article and read up on the 'internal border' section.

 

Surprisingly, there's currently six Schengen states that are imposing some form of internal border check, four of which based their reasoning on nothing to do with COVID (European Migrant Crisis instead cited). As it turns out, a state can, seemingly, impose border restrictions relatively easily. From Wikipedia:

 

"A Schengen member state is permitted to reinstate border controls with another Schengen member state for a short period where there is a serious threat to that state's "public policy or internal security" or when the "control of an external border is no longer ensured due to exceptional circumstances". When such risks arise out of foreseeable events, the state in question must notify the European Commission in advance and consult with other Schengen states.

The introduction of temporary controls at internal borders is a prerogative of the member states. Although the European Commission may issue an opinion about the necessity and proportionality of introducing temporary controls at internal borders, it cannot veto or override such a decision if it is taken by a member state."

 

It appears as if Poland can cite the foreseeable influx of Russian tourists disrupting internal security, or their presence being contrary to public policy, and just drop a note on the European Commission's desk. Certainly, the consultation requirement won't be an issue if they're already done so with the Baltics and Finland. Moreover, the EC seems absolutely powerless over the temporary controls - so long as Poland indeed brands them temporary. So while I don't think a Schengen state could terminate a visa issued by a foreign state, they most certainly can reinstate their border crossings. I'm positive Poland could then find some reason to exclude Russian passports, either directly or indirectly, when encountered at the border. For example, all they'd need to do is to reinstate the non-Sputnik vaccine requirement and the vast amount of Russian tourists are effectively banned.

 

I think this should certainly raise some alarms. 

Edited September 9, 2022 by slavaskii

[PakistaniRussian 83]

14 hours ago, slavaskii said:

So this led me down a really fascinating rabbit hole when I should instead be making headway on my Law Review Note, lol. As expected, this 'question' of a Schengen country refusing to recognize visas issued by another Schengen state seems to be a novel one, so I turned to the Wikipedia article and read up on the 'internal border' section.

 

Surprisingly, there's currently six Schengen states that are imposing some form of internal border check, four of which based their reasoning on nothing to do with COVID (European Migrant Crisis instead cited). As it turns out, a state can, seemingly, impose border restrictions relatively easily. From Wikipedia:

 

"A Schengen member state is permitted to reinstate border controls with another Schengen member state for a short period where there is a serious threat to that state's "public policy or internal security" or when the "control of an external border is no longer ensured due to exceptional circumstances". When such risks arise out of foreseeable events, the state in question must notify the European Commission in advance and consult with other Schengen states.

The introduction of temporary controls at internal borders is a prerogative of the member states. Although the European Commission may issue an opinion about the necessity and proportionality of introducing temporary controls at internal borders, it cannot veto or override such a decision if it is taken by a member state."

 

It appears as if Poland can cite the foreseeable influx of Russian tourists disrupting internal security, or their presence being contrary to public policy, and just drop a note on the European Commission's desk. Certainly, the consultation requirement won't be an issue if they're already done so with the Baltics and Finland. Moreover, the EC seems absolutely powerless over the temporary controls - so long as Poland indeed brands them temporary. So while I don't think a Schengen state could terminate a visa issued by a foreign state, they most certainly can reinstate their border crossings. I'm positive Poland could then find some reason to exclude Russian passports, either directly or indirectly, when encountered at the border. For example, all they'd need to do is to reinstate the non-Sputnik vaccine requirement and the vast amount of Russian tourists are effectively banned.

 

I think this should certainly raise some alarms. 

Thanks for the detailed research. Luckily, we both got vaccinated with the Pfizer in Turkey, so this wouldn't applied to us. If this is indeed temporary, then we are lucky because we are still waiting for I-129F approval (estimate is March 2023) and everything can change. We'll stick the plan of trying to get our case transferred to Istanbul, Turkey since we both have been living here with resident permits.

[Lynxyonok 316]

19 hours ago, slavaskii said:

"A Schengen member state is permitted to reinstate border controls with another Schengen member state for a short period where there is a serious threat to that state's "public policy or internal security" or when the "control of an external border is no longer ensured due to exceptional circumstances". When such risks arise out of foreseeable events, the state in question must notify the European Commission in advance and consult with other Schengen states.

And this is exactly what the four countries involved (ES, LA, LI, PL) had invoked.

 

The question is, how long can they keep it up and at what cost? Where's the proof?

Edited September 9, 2022 by Lynxyonok

[Kineo 93]

On 9/8/2022 at 1:30 PM, powerpuff said:

They have no mechanism to enforce that. A schengen visa allows one to visit any country in the schengen zone and there are zero security checks so I don’t see how they’ll be able to restrict anyone from coming to Poland. So it’ll be interesting to see…

 

They can still check VISA/Passport from what I have seen....

[OTa 0]

Hi all, first time here. My mother who lives in Moscow has her immigrant interview schedule in Warsaw at the end of November. We contacted Polish embassy in Moscow and they are not issuing visas to Russians for any reasons. I'm trying to transfer her case to Astana, Kazakhstan. I called the consulate in Astana and they advised me to email the request and the details of my mother's case to usakz@state.gov I emailed 8 days ago and again yesterday. No response so far. Had anyone have a successful experience moving their case? How are Russians supposed to travel to Poland for their interviews?

Edited October 6, 2022 by OTa

[OTa 0]

Hi, my mother has an interview in Warsaw scheduled for the end of Nov 2022. She cannot travel, because of the visa ban. Anyone tried to move their cases to other embassies? I'm trying to move hers to Kazakhstan with no success so far. Was told by the customer service in Astana to email to usakz@state.gov but getting no response for more than a week now.

Any advice?

[slavaskii 886]

4 minutes ago, OTa said:

Hi, my mother has an interview in Warsaw scheduled for the end of Nov 2022. She cannot travel, because of the visa ban. Anyone tried to move their cases to other embassies? I'm trying to move hers to Kazakhstan with no success so far. Was told by the customer service in Astana to email to usakz@state.gov but getting no response for more than a week now.

Any advice?

She can't get a Schengen visa or she has a Schengen visa already and can't get to Warsaw for some reason? What type of US visa is she applying for?

Edited October 7, 2022 by slavaskii