You're reading: Russian FMS head: Introduction of visas with CIS countries will cause more harm than good

Head of the Federal Migration Service of Russia (FMS) Konstantin Romodanovsky sees no sense in the suggestion to introduce visas for CIS country citizens to resolve migration problems.

"This will do Russia much more harm than produce any positive results," he said in a Wednesday interview with Interfax.

"What visas, if we are advancing along the road of the Customs Union, the Eurasian Economic Space?" he wondered.

In his opinion, the introduction of visas would disrupt family and economic ties.

“We realize that these are bilateral processes. If we introduce visas, then we will have to take travel visas ourselves. This will also be a blow to Russian citizens. We rarely travel to Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, but we travel much to Ukraine and Moldova,” Romodanovsky said.

He felt that the introduction of visa free entry to Russia starting in 2015 and reform of the system of temporary residency should improve the situation with migration.

Russian human rights commissioner Vladimir Lukin spoke of the need to introduce visas to Interfax earlier this week.

Most of the foreigners coming Russia for labor purposes arrive from former Soviet republics in Central Asia and hence don’t need any entry visas.

Earlier Romodanovsky said that a sticker would be attached to the ID of any foreigner coming for a period of over 90 days from a country with which Russia does not have visas.

“Foreign citizens, I means CIS countries, will freely enter. If you stay for a longer time, be good and get registered, get the sticker and you can remain,” Romodanovsky said.

“The sticker is supposed to indicate whether there is a work permit or not. In the latter case a foreigner comes here for medical treatment, education or some humanitarian purpose,” Romodanovsky said.

“Travels will remain visa-free, if we are speaking of CIS citizens, but the introduction of the sticker will become one more step to restore order. To obtain a sticker the foreigner will have to submit a minimal package of documents to the FMS,” Romodanovsky said.

In April 2013, FMS Deputy Head Anatoly Fomenko announced that the flow of migrants has grown compared to previous years. He said that at the time there were some 10.5 million foreign citizens in Russia – 2.5 million of them citizens of Uzbekistan, 1.1 million citizens of Tajikistan, over 500,000 citizens of Kyrgyzstan, 1.3 million citizens of Ukraine and over 500,000 citizens of Moldova.