EU Concludes Visa Facilitation and Readmission Agreements With Belarus

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European Union’s member states have approved visa facilitation, and readmission agreements with Belarus, the Council of the European Union announced through a statement.

“The Council [of the European Union] today adopted two decisions to conclude a visa facilitation agreement and a readmission agreement with Belarus,” the statement stressed, SchengenVisaInfo.com reports.

Both agreements were earlier passed by the European Parliament. Belarus and the EU will need to exchange the instruments of ratification in order to complete the ratification procedure.

In March, Chairman of the Parliamentary Committee for International Affairs, Andrey Savinykh announced that the visa facilitation and readmission agreements between Belarus and the European Union would be ratified at the opening of the spring session of the house of Representatives.

 “We think that these agreements will be ratified on a priority basis – on April 2, April 3 at the latest,” an official reported.

Belarus’ agreements were ratified in April, whereas the House of Representatives and the Council of the Republic of the National Assembly of Belarus decided to approve the documents on April 2.

The visa facilitation agreement will help Belarusian citizens to acquire short-term visas to the European Union, by reducing the visa fee to €35.

Belarusian nationals, who applied for a Schengen Visa from February this year, have been subject to the new Schengen Visa Code, which increased the Schengen visa fees from €60 to €80.

The visa facilitation plan of the EU with Belarus has been approved by the European Union ambassadors, and the Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko, who decided to sign the visa facilitation and readmission agreements with the EU, in September.

When the readmission agreement takes effect, Belarus and the European Union will have to readmit their own citizens, third-country nationals, and stateless persons, who do not meet or no longer meet the requirements to legally stay in each other’s territory.