Kosachyov ties halt of visa-free regime with Turkey to Russia's national security
MOSCOW. Nov 27 (Interfax) - Russia has suspended visa-free travel with Turkey because of the souring of their relations, but also to ensure Russia's national security, said Konstantin Kosachyov, head of the Federation Council Committee for International Affairs.
"In my view, there are two motives behind the decision to suspend visa-free regime with Turkey. First: the general souring of the bilateral relations, which was inevitable after the Turkish provocation of the Russian bomber. After what happened - and the tragedy is obviously being exacerbated by the Turkish leadership's refusal to apologize and admit their guilt - our relations cannot remain business as usual," Kosachyov told reporters on Friday.
The visa-free regime is always a sort of apogee in a bilateral relationship, an acknowledgement there are no major problems in it, he said. "But now, through Turkey's fault, we have slid down to the lowest point and are in the perigee. The tourist flow, business ties, humanitarian cooperation will now be scaled down significantly, which means that the decision to scrap the visa-free regime will not create vast problems for the Russians," the senator said.
The second reason for this decision is "the growing sense of Turkey's increasingly much closer ties with 'terrorist international' than they appeared until now," he said. "Such ties inevitably lead to infiltration of Turkey by extremist elements and its use for the terrorist fight against 'disagreeable' countries. The tightening of the visa regime in such cases is part and parcel of the system of measures to ensure own national security," Kosachyov said.