Schengen Area closed to Ukrainians in “nearest future,” minister says

The Schengen Area will be closed to Ukrainians for
non-essential visits “in the nearest future” owing to the country’s
epidemiological situation, Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said in an interview
with the segodnya.ua news site published on July 13. He cited Ukraine’s
infection rate of 62 per 100,000, compared to 16.3 per 100,000 in the E.U. “We
will be able to talk about removing the restriction on entering the Schengen
zone after Ukraine’s indicator will equal the E.U. average, or will be lower.
This is a key requirement. As I have already mentioned the numbers, you see
that so far we’re very far from that, unfortunately,” he said.

In the same interview, Kuleba said Hungary will impose
tighter restrictions to Ukrainians as of July 15, limiting entry to those with
relatives in Hungary, or some form of official residence in Hungary, in
addition to a few other categories. The announcement sparked an immediate rush
to cross Ukrainian border crossings with Hungary, prompting large pedestrian
queues and traffic jams, as reported by journalist Vitaliy Glagola on his
Telegram channel. 

On July 14, Kuleba announced that Ukrainians have entry
to 25 countries for summer tourism that most recently include the Bahamas
Islands and Lebanon. That’s in addition to the U.S., Great Britain, Serbia,
North Macedonia, and Montenegro.

Cases of the COVID-19 diseases caused by the coronavirus
bounced up to 835 on July 14, Health Minister Maksym Stepanov announced at his
daily press briefing this morning. An estimated 15 people died, while 977
recovered. The largest number of infections was reported in the Lviv region
(171) and the city of Kyiv (147), which is the latest daily record for the
capital. At the same time, only one casualty was reported.

Zenon Zawada: Kuleba’s statement indicates that Ukrainians won’t be able to visit
the E.U. this summer for non-essential visits, which means earning income for
hundreds of thousands who visit for brief periods of three months or less. Many
of them are likely to express their disappointment through political activity
of various sorts, with The People’s Servant party likely to take the biggest
hit. Otherwise, the overall coronavirus situation is stable in Ukraine. The
relatively high infection rate (compared to the E.U.) is offset by a low
casualty rate.