Express German visas and lawsuits in Ukraine

Hans-Jurgen Heimsoeth, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Germany to Ukraine, told a press conference yesterday that new entry visa procedures were legally effective for frequent visitors. People with at least two Schengen Visa stamps, or a year-long or long-term one, could apply for entry visas at newly established offices in Donetsk, Kyiv, Lviv, and Odesa.

The ambassador believes that the new visa procedures will help frequent visitors with red tape problems. Each applicant will pay 25.2 euros to VTS, a firm in charge of the paperwork, and 50 hryvnias for the courier delivery to the applicant’s home. Moreover, every applicant will have online access to the procedures and receive an SMS about his/her passport being ready to be submitted to the visa center, or mailed to the applicant’s address. This way veteran travelers won’t have to submit to visa interviews in Kyiv.

The German ambassador said the embassy had issued 110,000 entry visas in 2010, with 6.6 percent refusals, against 10.9 in 2009, with less than 50 percent of cost-free visas; that the amount of five-year visas had increased by 300 percent, along with an increasing number of individually issued one- or three-year visas.

When asked about the Euro-2012 and related EU visa issues, Heimsoeth said that since the soccer championships would be held in Poland and Ukraine, “the whole thing about the trips by Ukrainian soccer fans to Poland; I don’t doubt that this problem will be adequately resolved, so Ukrainian fans will be able to attend the games in Poland without bothering about their visas.”

Toward the end of the pressconference, the German ambassador agreed to answer only one political question. He had been among the ambassadors invited by the Prosecutor General of Ukraine to explain the si-tuation with the detention of Yulia Tymoshenko. Naturally the media people present were eager to hear what he had to say, considering that the PGU Office attributed the press conference to the international reverberations caused by the Tymoshenko criminal case. Here is what Ambassador Heimsoeth had to say in response to the following question posed by The Day:

How can the Ukrainian authorities handle this situation to assure the general public that they are actually combating corruption rather than making backstage justice deals, staging trials for their political opponents, as believed by many experts within and beyond Ukraine?

“I’m not going to say much in regard to details or how I assess what’s going on in Ukraine. I’m saying that the German Federal Government, the Chancellor’s Office, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs are closely following this [Tymoshenko] case. We are very serious about Ukraine’s intention of joining the European Union, so we are very serious about the keeping of the European standards, something Ukraine is also interested in. Finally, the statement made by Herr Hoyer on January 4, 2011, as an official of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Germany, remains topical. I would suggest that those who may have forgotten it re-read it.” 

The following statement was made by Werner Hoyer, Minister of State at the Federal Foreign Office:

“President Viktor Yanukovych’s intention of bringing Ukraine closer to the European Union and his related desire for stronger action against corruption in his country are to be welcomed. However, the names of those who are being investigated in this regard create the impression that the Ukrainian justice system is undertaking targeted, politically motivated actions against the former members of the Tymoshenko government.

The confirmation of this impression would present a major obstacle to Kyiv’s desire for closer ties with the European Union.”

When asked by journalists whether this statement should be studied again by those “upstairs,” the German diplomat said it should also be re-read by some in the media.