The Foreign Affairs Ministry of Ukraine has reported that in 2011 Ukrainians obtained 182,000 more Schengen visas compared to 2010, and their total number was 1.1 million.
"On May 15, 2012, the seventh session of the Ukraine-EU joint visa committee on the implementation of the agreement on the simplification of visa applications was held in Kyiv," Foreign Ministry Spokesman Oleksandr Dykusarov said at a briefing.
According to him, the Ukrainian side stated that there had been definite progress in the implementation of this document, and the statistical findings announced by the European commission proved this.
In particular, in 2011 the number of refusals to issue visas dropped from 4% in 2010 to 3.3% in 2011.
"Compared to 2010, the total number of issued Schengen visas grew by 182,000 in 2011, and reached 1.1 million visas," the spokesman said.
Moreover, the share of multi-entry visas grew by 35.5% (27.3% in 2010), and every third Schengen visa was free of charge in 2011.
At the same time, during the meeting the Ukrainian side pointed to problems that are appearing more often regarding this issue. In particular, this concerned some cases of unjustified refusals to issue visas.
"The European Commission assured the Ukrainian side that it would thoroughly study this matter, and respond to the remarks of the Ukrainian side soon," Dykusarov said.
