European Union will lose €21 billion if it bars Russian tourists to enter

Tuesday, August 30, 2022

The European Union will lose around €21 billion ($20.97 billion) if it bars Russian tourists from entering the bloc, State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin wrote on his official Telegram channel on Thursday, commenting on what he called “the frenzy of proposals to ban our citizens from entering the EU continues.”

According to the official, 80% of the world’s population does not support the sanctions against Moscow, which means Russian tourists have a myriad of places to visit outside the EU. Moreover, he suggests that Russia’s own tourism infrastructure should be developed to accommodate domestic travel.

In early August, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky mused that the Russians should “live in their own world until they change their philosophy,” and urged the West to refuse entry to Russian tourists. Moscow responded by saying that such proposals would only have a negative effect on all involved and called the measure “discriminatory.”

The calls have been mounting for the European Commission to ban Russian tourists from entering the EU’s borderless area over the war in Ukraine. France and Germany have so far refused to back Baltic Sea and some central European Union states on their initiative citing the freedom of travel principle.

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