The Baltic states have ruled out the possibility of accepting Russian draft dodgers or granting them asylum after Moscow announced a partial mobilization on Wednesday.
Latvia cited the measure as a reason to step up support for Ukraine and enhance its own security.
“Latvia will not issue humanitarian or other types of visas to those Russian citizens who [seek to] avoid mobilization,” Latvian Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkevics said in a tweet on Wednesday, citing “security reasons.” When asked about the decision by a local LSM broadcaster, he said that only those who could prove they had been “against the war” before the mobilization and who faced “persecution” and administrative punishment in Russia might have a chance to be accepted by Latvia.
“If you try to tell me now that hundreds of thousands have suddenly received a religious, divine revelation that it is not good to go to war … to write about the destruction of Ukraine on social networks, then I think no one will accept these arguments,” he said.