International Russia travel restrictions

colleenF
Fri, 25 Mar 2022 08:35:45 +0000

After Ukraine was invaded by Russia on Feb. 22, multiple countries began enforcing travel restrictions on Russia, including closing off airspace to Russian flights and limiting Russian travel companies from doing business internationally. On March 5, Visa and MasterCard suspended transactions in Russia.

The European Union closed the airspace of its member nations to all Russian planes on Feb. 27, including Russia’s commercial airline, Aeroflot. Non-EU European countries Norway and the United Kingdom also banned flights. In North America, the US and Canada banned all flights from Russia as well. Russia, in response, banned flights from each country that had banned Russian flights from flying over its airspace. Most countries, including the US, asked airlines to avoid Ukrainian and western Russian airspace until further notice.