Russia and Iran may cancel visa requirements in 2017

Visa requirements for visiting Russia and Iran soon may be dropped, the speaker of Russia’s Federation Council upper parliament house, Valentina Matviyenko, said.

She mentioned a recent agreement, which suggested easier visa formalities for certain categories of travelers, and thus the number of trips from Iran to Russia doubled in 2015. The number of trips from Russia to Iran has also increased, Matviyenko said.

“Our consular services continue consultations on further easing of the visa regime, including for organized tourist groups, and further on the visa requirement between our countries may be cancelled fully,” TASS cited her as saying.

The easier regime, or cancelling visas, she continued, “opens big opportunities for businesses, for youth, student exchanges, for tourist exchanges.” “This is important both from the economic point of view, it is important also from the humanitarian point of view for improvement of the friendly relations between our countries,” the speaker said.

Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani will pay an official visit to Russia next year, the speaker added.

“I invited my colleague to pay an official visit to Russia and he accepted the invitation,” Matvienko said.

She also noted that the Russian-Iranian contacts were growing rapidly.(Vestnik Kavkaza)