News of the year 2010

The Agreement provides bilateral simplifying of the procedure of obtaining a single-entry visa valid for up to three months. This agreement applies to the citizens of Russia and Switzerland who are the members of official delegations, businessmen, drivers and registered international passenger and cargo carriers.

It becomes easier to obtain residence and work permits in Russia for foreign citizens. Vladimir Putin gave the order to the director of Federal Migration Service Konstantin Romodanovsky to analyze and make proposals for facilitation of documents processing for foreigners.

The museum is placed in the pavilion № 11 of Moscow's Sokolniki Park. It occupies a total area of 700 square meters; the exhibition is situated on 500 square meters from the general seven hundred.

Championship will be held in June–July 2018 during four – five weeks. Matches of the championship will be held throughout Russia. As member cities at this time were announced: Moscow, St. Petersburg, Volgograd, Kazan, Nizhny Novgorod, Kaliningrad, Rostov-on-Don, Krasnodar, Saransk, Sochi, Yaroslavl, Samara and Yekaterinburg, but at the end no more than ten-eleven cities will remain.

One of the oldest Russian holdings “Intourist” will create a joint enterprise with one of European largest tour operators Thomas Cook Group, – informs the news agency RIA Novosti.

Moscow Radisson Royal Hotel, former hotel “Ukraine”, won first prize in the main event of the tourism industry – World Travel Awards 2010 and became the best Russian hotel in the category “Lux”.

Russia has tightened visa rules for Germany. Now for the Russian visa German citizens should present at the consulate the information on their income over the last month, confirmation from bank account and other documents proving their financial solvency and guarantee their return to homeland.

It will be easier to get a Russian visa for foreign scientists working in Skolkovo, – said the Director of Russian Federal Migration Service Konstantin Romodanovsky on Wednesday, November 3.

“Modified Canadian questionnaire goes beyond the current criteria... It is discordant with the overall positive dynamics of Russian-Canadian relations and complicates obtaining visas for Russian citizens”, – said Andrey Nesterenko.

Ordinary private visa for three months issued to foreign citizens will now be delivered not only by the invitation of a Russian citizen, but also by the invitation of a foreigner with a residence permit in Russia. Also, foreign relatives of a Russian citizen can obtain a visa, if they enter the country with him.

Summit of “three” was completed in the French resort town of Deauville, – informs the newspaper “Izvestia”. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy took part in the informal tripartite talks.

In Russia from 2009, the need to attract migrant workers reduces, – stated the Director of Employment and Labor Migration Department of RF Tatiana Blinova at the roundtable on the problems of unemployment held in State Duma.

At the conference taking place Oct. 6 in the department of economic development the decision has been taken to gather all the terminals of the largest Russian airport Sheremetyevo under the direction of a single company.

The first project of the interstellar hotel will be developed by RSC Energia and Russian company “Orbital Technologies”. The hotel may be launched into the orbit in late 2015 – early 2016. Its volume would be approximately 20 cubic meters and it can accommodate seven people at one time. Passengers of the station will be able to spend in the space from a few days to a year.

Within the bounds of week in halls of exhibition center “Crocus-Expo” were held three large thematic exhibitions devoted to business, traditional and exclusive tourism.

The research done by online hotel reservation system hotels.com has shown that average cost of hotel rooms in Russia has decreased in the second quarter 2010.

At the meeting, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Mary McAleese have discussed the questions of bilateral cooperation and strategic partnership between Russia and EU, as well as problems of European security because next year Ireland will lead the OSCE.

Federal Agency of Tourism of Russia and statistics announced preliminary results for the last six months of 2010 concerning the number of foreign tourists visiting Russia. Their number was 884,000 people, which is 17.4% above the same period during the last year.

In Moscow airport Sheremetyevo the first terminal for passengers of budget airlines will open, – informs the news agency Interfax. This possibility appeared after opening of the South airport complex, which includes terminals D, E, F and “Aero express”.

The new railway line will link Moscow and Nice, – informs the press service of Railways. The route organized by JSC “Russian Railways” will go for the first time on September 23 and pass through Belarus, Poland, Czech Republic, Austria and Italy.

Moscow Sheremetyevo Airport in conference with “Troy” LLC has opened a paid shuttle service which runs since August 10 on the outer bypass road between the northern and southern terminals. The fare if this bus is 60 rubles, – informs portal Travel.ru.

The countries of Europe and CIS offered help to extinguish the fire in the territory of Russia. It is the question of formation of the international land and air group of fire-fighting. The forces of Ukraine, Poland, Bulgaria, Germany, Italy, France and other countries will be involved.

Russia intends to join the International convention on simplification and harmonization of the custom procedures in the nearest time, – reports “Interfax”.

Spain supports the idea of the entering of Russia in the zone of the visa-free regime with the countries of the European Union, – has informed the ambassador of Spain in Russia Juan Antonio Mark in the interview to the agency “Interfax”.

Network of cheap hotels – hostels – for foreign tourists is planned to be opened in Moscow, informed the head of the committee of tourism Gregory Antjufeev, quotes agency “Interfax”.

Prime minister of Russia Vladimir Putin during his speech in Kislovodsk has supported and approved the ten years plan for the development of region offered by Vice-premier Alexander Khloponin. In particular, this plan mentions the problems of the development of the tourist branch on North Caucasus.

For the first time Russia has been invited to the session of “Weimar triangle”. On June, 23^rd the session of the advisory forum took place and Russia was represented by the Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov.

Russia should become the country of the dream for the foreigners, – Russian president Dmitry Medvedev has declared in the performance at the opening of the annual economic forum in Saint Petersburg.

The order on the obligatory classification of the Russian hotels was signed by the minister of sports, tourism and youth policy Vitaly Mutko.

Russian president Dmitry Medvedev at meeting on progress of the financial market has set the task to create in the country the financial center attractive to foreign investors.

Consul General of the US in Russia, Richard Beer gave an interview to the agency “Interfax” concerning the situation in the sphere of tourism and migration between Russia and the US.

Travelling with pets to Russia, as well as in Russia, has now become easier. The company Animal Airways – the world's first organizer of pets transportation – has opened an office in Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport, – reported news agency RIA Novosti.

May 12 of this year, State Duma issued a series of amendments to the Law on “Legal Status of Foreign Citizens in Russia”. These amendments are aimed to improve the mechanism of labor migration and facilitate entry into Russia of valuable professionals, – states news agency Interfax.

For the first time since formation of the Russian Federation Russia has opened the exhibition hall – the country preferred to rent already ready space at organizers in post-Soviet years.

Meeting of Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister of Norway Jens Stoltenberg ended by signing a number of important documents in the sphere of cooperation between the two countries.

Interruptions in flights, caused by volcanic eruption in Iceland, and a cloud of volcanic ash hanging over a large part of Europe put in a hopeless situation thousands of people around the world. The passengers of canceled flights were forced to huddle in airports, many of them with expired visas. Only at the beginning of the week flights began slowly to recover and people were able to get home.

Foreigners, forced to stay in Russia because of flight cancellations caused by the volcanic eruption in Iceland would be able to extend the visa without leaving the airport.

Sheremetyevo International Airport outlined some changes in its terminals, said Travel.ru.

One of the capital's agencies has organized a tour along the Stalin's tall buildings within the bounds of the Days of Architecture in Moscow. The date of the trip is scheduled for April 11.

Conference on Tourism with participation of representatives of Russia and Japan was held at the Federal Agency for Tourism. At the conference, Russia was presented by the deputy head of Rostourism Alexander Radkov, Japan – by Assistant of the Head of the Japan Tourism Agency Masaaki Kai.

Space tourism in Russia will be resumed – quoted RIA Novosti the head of RKK “Energia” Vitaly Lopota. It is planned to start tourist flights in 2012, as the number of annual launches “Soyuz” spacecraft will be increased from four to five, allowing for one of the flights to involve tourist.

Two leading international tourist exhibitions will take place in March of this year. These are ITB – 2010 in Germany, and Russia International exhibition MITT.

Agreement on simplifying procedure for issuing visas to citizens of Russia and Iceland comes into force on 1 March 2010. Agreement itself, as well as the readmission agreement, was signed between the two governments in September 2008, after which all the necessary preparatory work for innovation was done.

Resolution on the procedure for temporarily imported cars in Russia came into force on Feb. 25, 2010, as reported news agency RIA Novosti.

British Minister for European Affairs Chris Bryan gave an interview to the Interfax news agency, where he explained the reluctance of Britain to impose visa-free regime with Russia.

Center of Polar Tourism will be built in Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Area by joint forces of Administration of the district and the Finnish consortium “Sofi”.

The rapid growth of hotel space this year, obviously, made a disservice to the capital hoteliers. As reported by the Interfax agency, according to a study conducted by Blackwood, in 2009 Moscow hotels’ load significantly declined compared with last year to approximately 50%.

This year Pancake Day will be celebrated not only in different cities of Russia, but also in Europe.

Resolution signed by Russian Government in 2009 “On Approval about residence on the territory of Russia of foreign citizens coming for tourism purposes on ferries with passenger transportation permit”, which allowed foreigners to stay 72 hours in Russia without visas, bore first fruits.

Jan. 12 at a meeting in Moscow, the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov and Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Moratinos discussed the possibility of further expansion of cooperation between Russia and the EU. Due to the fact that in this half-year Spain is the Chairman of the European Union, Russia holds the major hope on this partner.

In early January, the French company “Alstom” has delivered to Finland the first high-speed train “Allegro”, which will ply the route between St. Petersburg and Helsinki.