Visa problems are hindering Russians' arrival in Greece

Expensive flights and problems with obtaining long-term visas are the main reasons why Russian tourists are increasingly choosing Greece as a holiday destination.

About this, how writes GreekReporter, the managing director of the company “Tez Tour Greece” Dimitris Charitidis told a TASS correspondent:

“There are practically no Russian tourists at the moment – neither on the island of Crete, nor in Greece as a whole. According to preliminary data, several thousand Russians visited Greece this year, I don't have exact data now, but this takes into account people with dual citizenship and those who are going to visit friends, that is, the figure should be at least divided in half to get the number of those who arrived as tourists. There are wealthy tourists who are used to going to Sani Resort [курорт на греческом полуострове Халкидики] and some more expensive hotels in Elounda [на Крите]so they come, although it is inconvenient to fly from Russia.”

According to Mr. Haritidis, Russians previously had multiple-entry visas that were still valid, but now 2.5 years have passed and some visas are expiring:

“And the new visas are issued strictly for 3 weeks-1 month. Accordingly, fewer people fly with Schengen visas in hand. Some even choose alternative destinations instead of Greece, where they need to fly with transfers. There are now few tourists from Russia, the Greek office of our company receives more tourists from the Baltic countries, the Balkans, Romania, Moldova.”

He stressed that, in addition to visas, the main problem remains the flight:

“There are no direct flights. They mostly fly via Turkey and Armenia now. In economy class, a round-trip ticket for one person from Moscow costs €1,200 – 1,300. And for some reason, the most expensive alternatives were via Serbia. You can also fly via Egypt and the UAE, but it is still more popular via Turkey and Armenia. The most suitable option is to fly via Turkey, but Armenia is also convenient for the Greek islands, because there are charters to the islands from there – from Moscow you can fly to Yerevan, and from there use a charter to Crete.”

According to the Bank of Greece, a record 30.08 million tourists visited Greece last year, 2023. Among them were 35.7 thousand tourists from Russia, although several years ago about 800 thousand Russians came to Greece annually. In January-June 2024, 11.6 million tourists have already arrived in Greece (an increase of 15.5% compared to the first six months of last year). In the first half of 2024, only 5.5 thousand Russians visited Greece, which is 58.6% less than in the same period of 2023 (13.3 thousand).

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