Plan to freeze 2007 deal will make it harder and more expensive for Russians to get Schengen-area documents, FT reports

The Financial Times is reporting that the EU is set to suspend its visa travel agreement with Russia this week.

The plan to freeze the 2007 deal will make it harder and more expensive for Russians to get Schengen-area documents, the FT reports.

It comes after some eastern member states threatened to unilaterally close their borders to Russian tourists, with other countries calling for collective action to stop ordinary Russians from travelling to the EU on tourist visas. Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy has previously called for a complete ban.

The FT reports:

As a first step, ministers plan to give political support to suspending the EU-Russia visa facilitation agreement at a two-day meeting in Prague that begins on Tuesday, three officials involved in the talks told the Financial Times.

A senior EU official involved in the talks said:

It is inappropriate for Russian tourists to stroll in our cities, on our marinas. We have to send a signal to the Russian population that this war is not OK, it is not acceptable.

Parts of the 2007 deal relating to free movement of government officials and businessmen were suspended in late February. A wider suspension would remove preferential treatment for Russians when applying for all EU visas, requiring more documents, making them more expensive and significantly increasing waiting times.

The senior EU official added that deeper changes could be introduced by the end of the year:

We are in an exceptional situation and it requires exceptional steps. We want to go beyond suspending the visa facilitation.