Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Latvia’s embassy in Moscow has observed increased interest from Russian citizens in leaving Russia, reports Ministry of Foreign Affairs press-secretary Jānis Beķeris.
He explained that in spite of amendments to the Immigration Law, which halt the issue of residence permits to Russian citizens until 30 June 2023, the number of requests for residence permits received and forwarded to the Office of Citizenship and Migration Affairs continues increasing, especially from Russian citizens – repatriates – for the purpose of reuniting with family members who are Latvian citizens and recipients of EU green cards.
Additionally, according to the ministry’s press-secretary, the interest for acquisition of Latvian citizenship has also increased. Following the decision to cease the issue of visas to Russian citizens, except for cases of exception, the number of requests for visas has decreased.
The number of consular services provided has increased following the closure of Latvia’s offices in St. Petersburg and Pskov. Demand is especially high from persons who previously received consular services in St. Petersburg, said Beķeris.
He also said there’s been a surge in the interest of Latvian citizens to return to the country in the couple of weeks after the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
At the moment the embassy currently works with a handful of families that are preparing to relocate to Latvia.
Beķeris stressed there high demand among Latvian citizens to acquire personal identification documents from the embassy, but this trend was observed in the past as well, because passport validity terms will soon end for a large number of Latvian citizens.
In the first week after the start of the war there was an interest for travel documents to return to Latvia. Currently, when receiving consular services in the embassy, Latvian citizens report plans to travel to Latvia for the summer, not for life. There is also increased interest observed among foreigners for eID cards to be able to receive e-services remotely, since it is no longer possible to receive a visa and services in Latvia in person.
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Beķeris stressed that a considerable portion of the embassy’s work consists of answering e-mails and phone calls. For example, the embassy answered 2 000 e-mails in March and 1 275 in April. Russian residents prefer using the phone or e-mail for communication instead of studying information available on the embassy’s website and other information sources.
On 24 February 2022 Russia commenced a military invasion of Ukraine.