Traveling from Russia to Armenia by internal passports, but when?

Since September 2015, based on the assignment of Prime Minister of Armenia Hovik Abrahamyan, the State Migration Service of the country has been considering the possibility of allowing the entry of Russian citizens into the territory of Armenia by internal passports. The state service has also been asked to prepare a proposal for an appropriate solution for their Russian counterparts. «The Armenian proposal is fully developed, and the Russian counterparts have been informed about it, however, still no response is received,” said Gagik Yeganyan, Head of the Migration Service of Armenia in his interview to RUSARMINFO. According to statistics, only 10% of Russian citizens have foreign passports. The rest, based on various reasons, doesn’t leave the country, and thanks to the suggestion of Armenia any Russian will be able to travel outside the country, says Mikhail Butrimov, Deputy chairman of the Council on the youth policy of the «Rodina» political party.

«The positive response from the Russian side is a matter of time, because this offer is beneficial not only to the Armenian side, and the answer is delayed for bureaucratic reasons,» mentions in his interview to RUSARMINFO Mikhail Butrimov. Armenia, taking advantage of the difficult political situation, wants to increase tourist turnover of the country, says Russian political analyst Nikolai Shlyamin. «For example, Greece receives about a billion rubles from the Russian tourists, while to take into account the current euro rate and complex situation in the East, Armenia has all chances to increase financial flows in the economy at the expense of Russian nationals,” adds Nikolay Shlyamin in his interview to RUSARMINFO. Note: According to the official statistics of the Federal Agency for Tourism, in the 1st quarter of 2015 about 8,370 Russian citizens visited Armenia for touristic purposes. With this result, Armenia is just on the 33rd place in the list of the most popular destinations for Russian nationals.