Currently, a foreign student may initially apply only for a three-month student visa in his home country
The Russian Science and Education Ministry has prepared a bill to ease visa requirements for foreign students of Russian universities in a bid to promote Russian higher education.
Currently, a foreign student may initially apply only for a three-month student visa in his home country. After this period, he or she should apply to the local office of the Federal Migration Service (FMS) to have the visa extended. The FMS issues a one-year multi-visa, which may be extended further for a one-year period during the entire duration of a student’s academic program.
“The majority of the academic programs takes a longer period, that’s why, in order to ensure the competitive advantage of Russian universities’ academic programs, the possibility of issuing multi-visas for students for a longer term should be considered,” reads an explanatory note to the bill, submitted on Thursday to the official public database of legal initiatives.
However, the visas should be issued to a term that does not exceed three years, the note reads.
According to the Russian education and science ministry, more than 120,000 foreign students did their academic studies at 532 educational institutions all across Russia in 2014. In 2015, their number grew to about 137,000.
