FT: How Czechia wants to shut European borders to Russian agents

Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, governments have expelled hundreds of Russian diplomats, claiming they were intelligence agents.

However, according to Financial Times, others are still issuing visas to Moscow’s envoys, giving them access to the Schengen zone and the right to move without restriction in 24 of the 27 member states, plus Switzerland, Norway and Iceland.

Prague last week circulated a paper with ideas to prevent this as part of negotiations on the EU’s 12th package of sanctions against Moscow, which member states still need to approve.

The central European country expelled more than 70 Russians last year in relation to the war in Ukraine and Russia’s alleged involvement in a 2014 attack on an ammunition warehouse that killed two people.

The Czech Republic now wants Russian diplomats to receive visas and residence permits that only allow travel within the host country, and not the rest of the Schengen area. It also wants the EU to only accept biometric passports, which are harder to forge or link to fake identities.

A particular issue raised by Prague is that of officials granted visas by Austria in order to work at the UN institutions in Vienna, who are then able to travel to the Czech Republic or elsewhere.

“There are agents of [Russia’s military intelligence service] GRU and other services arriving in Czech territory. It is very complicated in Schengen to control this,” said an EU diplomat.

The debate is still in its early stages, and the complex legal issues involved mean that any change is unlikely to figure in the package currently under discussion.

The proposals were sent to European capitals by the European Commission last week, and governments are still debating a ban on Russian diamonds and tighter measures to enforce a price cap on Russian oil.

The Austrian government and the commission did not respond to a request for comment.