Dozens and even hundreds of luxury cars with Russian license plates took up parking spaces at the Helsinki airport: their owners came here to get on a plane and fly to Europe. As a reminder, Finland remains one of the key transit routes for Russian tourists who wish to travel to Europe, as before. In connection with this, dissatisfaction with Finland’s visa policy is growing in Europe.
The EU has closed its airspace to Russian aircraft since the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, forcing anyone who wants to travel to Europe to cross the border or take detours using non-Western airlines.
Since Russia’s anti-covid restrictions expired in mid-July, the number of Russian tourists using Finland as a transit point to access Europe has increased sharply. Meanwhile, dissatisfaction is growing in EU countries that Russian citizens are allowed to enter the bloc while the war in Ukraine continues.
According to The Guardian, you only need to glance around the parking lot at Helsinki Airport to spot dozens, if not hundreds, of high-end cars with Russian license plates, including a Bentley, the new Mercedes-Benz S-Class sedan, and a Porsche 911 Turbo S.
“It amazes me. I would like them not to be here before the situation in Ukraine is resolved,” the publication quoted the words of one Finnish traveler.
We will remind since flights from Russia to the EU were stopped, Finland became a transit country for many Russians who want to travel to other European countries. “Many saw in this a circumvention of the sanctions regime. There are many tourists from Russia at Helsinki airport now,” said Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto, speaking about transit tourism.
By the way, Russian tourists in Finland began to be greeted with the Ukrainian national anthem – details here.
Finland said last week that it would limit the number of tourist visas issued to Russia by 10 times from September 1 after displeasure over the free movement of Russian travelers amid the war in Ukraine.
Russians continue to enter Finland using visas issued by other EU countries in the borderless Schengen zone. “They come here with Schengen visas issued by different countries and then continue their journey through Helsinki airport,” the official said.
According to a survey conducted by the Finnish border guard in August, about 2/3 of Russians cross Finland’s eastern border with a Schengen visa issued by a country other than Finland. “Hungary, Spain, Italy, Austria, Greece, and Spain usually issue visas to Russians and are usually among the countries that issue visas every year,” border guard officer Mert Sasioglu explained, the newspaper reported.
However, many eastern EU members have already stopped issuing tourist visas to Russian citizens shortly after February 24, but Russians with visas issued by other EU countries are still allowed to enter all EU states. For example, this was done by Estonia and Latvia. Meanwhile, Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielus Landsbergis said on Tuesday that Lithuania would seek a “regional solution” to ban Russian tourists if EU member states cannot agree on bloc-wide sanctions, and is expected to hold a meeting next week for negotiations in Prague with Latvia, Estonia, Finland and Poland on the sidelines of the meeting of EU foreign ministers.
“First of all, we are looking for a European solution, because it is the most stable and legally correct. If we do not achieve this, we do not rule out the possibility of finding a regional solution that would include the Baltic states, Poland, and possibly Finland,” Landsbergis told reporters in the Lithuanian capital Vilnius, admitting, however, that such a step would be “difficult.”
According to a Finnish official, Schengen rules do not allow Finland to close the border to citizens of certain nationalities, as such sanctions can only be adopted together with the EU. “As Finland and the Baltic countries plan to limit these visas, it would be good if all EU countries took similar decisions,” he added.
This opinion is shared by many Finns who use the capital’s airport. “There must be an EU decision to close the border,” The Guardian quoted a local traveler as saying. We would like to add that Finland intends to raise this issue at the next meeting of EU foreign ministers in the Czech Republic on August 30.