Ukraine govt will not rush to introduce visas with Russia - Yatseniuk
Ukraine's Prime Minister Arseniy Yatseniuk has warned against any hasty steps to switch to visas and the use of international passports with regard to Russia.
According to the Ukrainian government's press service, Yatseniuk made this statement early on Thursday morning upon arrival in Brussels, where the political section of the Association Agreement between Ukraine and the European Union should be signed.
"The principle of "measure three times and cut once" ought to be applied to this issue," he said, when commenting on the prospects for introducing visas for Russian citizens.
Yatseniuk said that Russia had repeatedly raised the issue of switching to international passports and visas with regard to other CIS countries.
"That is why such an initiative on the part of Ukraine will hardly be effective in terms of its influence on the Russian Federation. At the same time, this problem has gained an important humanitarian dimension in Ukraine itself since a very large number of Ukrainian citizens, primarily people who live in the east and the south of our state and go to Russia to earn money or have relatives on the other side of the border, are interested in maintaining visa-free travel," he said.
The Ukrainian government wants to heed the specific interests of the population living in the country's southeastern regions, and its cautious attitude toward the visa issue is quite natural, Yatseniuk said.
Yatseniuk also said that due to his visit to Brussels, he was unable to present all of his arguments on this matter at a recent session of the National Security and Defense Council, promising to discuss these issues with Ukraine's acting President and Verkhovna Rada Speaker Oleksandr Turchynov as soon as he returned to Kyiv.
After its session on Wednesday, the National Security and Defense Council ordered the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry to introduce visa requirements for Russian citizens.
