Transcript of the above video:

This whole video, I thought of titling it first of all "The Russians are coming, the Russians are coming", but this whole story that we have seen roughly in the last week, I have not actually commented on it yet because I was kind of hoping to see how exactly it was going to play out; we will get into that analysis here in a minute. For now it is still a little bit up in the air, but yeah the question posed is "are Russians really getting a 90-day Visa Exemption in Thailand?" So to be clear, presently for example most Western countries, the Anglosphere if you will, the West, those folks are going to get a 30-day stamp by and large in their passport upon arrival. Now certain other countries, Brazil for example comes to mind, has a bilateral agreement with Thailand effectively it is my understanding that they get 90 days on arrival in Thailand; certain other countries have different protocols associated with Visa Exemption status when travelling into Thailand. 

The reason for this video, I thought of making this after reading a recent article from the Pattaya Mail, that is pattayamail.com, the article is titled: Thailand's latest Visa policy reflects much wider economic hopes. Quoting directly: "The latest Thai Immigration news which abolishes visas for Chinese and Russian tourists on a trial basis is certainly part of that policy. Chinese citizens can enter Thailand visa free for 30 days which can be extended 30 days more at Thai Immigration. Russian nationals next month will have the same Visa free opportunities for 90 days, a rare privilege formally extended only to South Korea and a handful of Latin American countries. Both President Xi and President Putin said they were well pleased with the Immigration move." Well first things first here. We have already discussed the China thing but with regard to Russia, I am not sure this is just Visa Exemption on arrival, and the reason for that, I was also reading in the Thai Examiner, that is thaiexaminer.com, the article is titled: Russians to get 90 day-day visa on arrival as tourist numbers wobble in October ahead of high season. Quoting directly: "The government will introduce a standard 90-day visa on arrival for all Russian tourists landing in Thailand. It comes as demand from Russia is picking up."

Well first of all let's be clear. There is a difference between visa-on-arrival and Visa Exemption. I think I am going to do another video contemporaneously with this one where I get into that deeply. Folks could argue it is a semantic point. I see the argument there but as we will get into when we quote further, saying that Russians just get 90 days on arrival, I don't know that that's necessarily completely true. Quoting further: "With signs of weakness in vital foreign tourism numbers as the country draws near to the opening of the high season, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has announced the extension of the visa period for Russian nationals, which will come into effect on the 1st of November, 2023 and last until the 30th of April, 2024". And this was the key line here that I thought was useful. Well 1) note it doesn't begin until the 1st of November so as of the time of this video it is not in effect yet. It is also temporary as is the Chinese Visa Exemption that we discussed but, quoting further: "It allows for a Visa-on-arrival with a Visa Extension for Russian tourists with national passports allowing them to stay in the Kingdom for up to 90 days." So I am not entirely certain that when we see this come online in November, that it will look like a true 90-day stamp just for arriving in Thailand on a Russian passport. Again, it doesn't come into effect until November.

As with everything I was trying to wait to even talk about this on this channel until we got past the date of implementation so we had a better idea of how it was actually going to be implemented. Okay, that has yet to come but again based on this from the Thai Examiner and the Thai Examiner is usually quite meticulous in ascertaining little details like that, it wouldn't surprise me if some sort of accommodation was made that said "yeah you get 30 days stamped in when you enter and you can go down and get another 60 days for example by extending at Thai Immigration". Again, whether or not that is actually how this is going to play out remains to be seen. It seems to be the case from what we are seeing from at least one source. If that were the case that would mean that it would be very similar to just the standard Tourist Visa which most folks, it is a little different insofar as you get 60 days on arrival with an ability to extend by 30 days. But again, we don't know how this thing is going to play out because it's not going to be implemented until November 1, so we will certainly keep you updated on this channel as the situation evolves.