STARTING October 1, 2019, all nationals of the Philippines may be granted an e-visa to enter Saint Petersburg and the Leningrad region, the Russian foreign ministry has announced.
The e-visa is free. Invitations, hotel booking confirmations or any other documents confirming the purpose of a visitor’s journey to the Russian Federation are not required for an e-visa. The period for issuing an e-visa will take no more than four calendar days from the date of submission of the complete application, the ministry added.
To obtain an e-visa, a Philippine national must fill out an application on a special site of the Russian Foreign Ministry https://electronic-visa.kdmid.ru/spb_home_en.html no later than four days prior to the expected arrival date.
E-visa is
a single-entry visa and issued for 30 calendar days from the date of its
issuance. The permitted stay in the Russian Federation with an e-visa is up to
eight days starting from the date of entry, within its validity period. E-visa
validity and/or the permitted stay under it cannot be extended.
An e-visa issuance notification will be posted on the special site https://evisa.kdmid.ru/en-US/Home/StatusCheck.
E-visas can be of the following categories only: ordinary business visa (purpose of journey is business), ordinary tourist visa (purpose of journey is tourism), and ordinary humanitarian visa (purposes of journey are sports, cultural, scientific and technological ties). If the purpose of a journey to the Russian Federation does not correspond to any of the above, one should apply for a traditional (nonelectronic) visa at a diplomatic mission or consular office of the Russian Federation.
Foreign citizens should leave the territory of the Russian Federation only through checkpoints of the constituent entity of the Russian Federation which they entered.
Their passports must be valid for at least six months from the date of application for an e-visa, and must have free space for border crossing stamps. Foreign citizens who have arrived in the Russian Federation with e-visas are required to have a medical insurance valid on Russian territory for the entire period of stay.
The ministry clarified, meanwhile, that the allowed period of stay in the Russian Federation of up to eight days under an e-visa does not imply that one can stay for the entire 192 hours (24 hours multiplied by 8). The period of stay in the Russian Federation always starts at midnight of the day of passage through passport control upon entry regardless of the actual time of passage through passport control.