Baltic States – CIS, EU – CIS, Latvia, Lithuania, Passenger cars, Russia, Transport

Russia has for past two months refusing entry or exit to travelers from Lithuania and other countries of the European Union (EU) via Belarus, with an exception made for truck drivers and passengers aboard international trains. All other EU residents, even diplomats, are forced to go to and from Russia via Latvia.

"We raised the problem at a meeting with Russia's Foreign Vice-Minister Grigory Karasin. A pledge was made to solve it together with Belarus, however, the situation has not changed," said EU Ambassador to Russia Vygaudas Usackas, a Lithuanian diplomat who also had to revise his route of travel home to Vilnius.

Lithuania's Foreign Ministry has handed a note to Russia over the new border-crossing scheme. According to the ministry's response to Lietuvos Zinios, the situation was discussed with the Russian ministries of Foreign Affairs and Transport, which said that the changes were due to scrapping of border checkpoints on the Russian-Belarusian border in the wake of union treaties. Consequently, foreigners going to Russia are forced to cross external checkpoints of the Customs Union border, which conduct checks of individuals crossing the border. The changes are said to be temporary, with traffic of individual