Zbigniew Rau made the declaration during an informal meeting of EU foreign ministers in Prague, the Czech Republic, on Tuesday, Polish state news agency PAP reported.
On the sidelines of the Prague get-together, Rau met with his counterparts from the Baltic states and Finland to discuss possible steps.
“The talks were satisfactory and the results promising,” Poland’s top diplomat told reporters.
He said that Poland, the Baltic states and Finland had “similar stances” on the issue of tourist visas for Russian nationals, as all share a border with Russia or Belarus and have similar security concerns.
Rau added that officials from the five countries would “work well into the night” to strike a common position and present it on Wednesday when EU foreign ministers meet for a second day of talks in Prague.
In search of EU-wide consensus
“We’ll be seeking to forge an EU-wide consensus,” Rau said, adding that it would be “a challenge.”
The Polish foreign minister noted that a visa issued in one EU country could be valid for up to a year, across the bloc’s passport-free Schengen zone.
And so “Russian nationals who obtain their visas in Malta or Portugal are able to stay in Lithuania or Finland, for instance,” he added.
‘Our security is at stake’
“But those who host Russians on their beaches have vastly different perceptions than us, who are Russia’s neighbours,” Rau stressed. “For them it’s a commercial issue, while for us it’s an existential one, because our security is at stake.”
Rau said that diplomats from Poland, the Baltics and Finland were seeking solutions that were “politically necessary and legally acceptable.”
Restrictions or full ban?
On Monday, the EU’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, said in a radio interview that during their Prague meeting, the bloc’s foreign ministers would approve “further restrictions” on EU entry for Russian nationals, but were “unlikely” to issue an all-out ban.
Borrell called for “a more selective approach,” saying that since Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine, some 300,000 Russians who do not support the war have left their country.
While Poland, the Baltic states and Finland are advocating a suspension of EU tourist visas for Russians, France, Germany and the tourism-oriented countries of southern Europe are against such measures, the PAP news agency reported.
Wednesday is day 189 of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
(pm/gs)
Source: IAR, PAP, tvp.info