| 19 January 2010 During 2009, diplomatic and consular representations of the Republic of Latvia abroad have issued 120 047 visas and collected state fees for the processing of visa applications at the amount of 2 846 974 LVL. If compared to the figures for 2008, the total number of visas issued by Latvian representations abroad has decreased only by 10% instead of a 30% forecast. The year 2009 saw the highest increase in the numbers of visas issued by the Latvian embassies in Azerbaijan (39%) and Turkey (16%), as well as by the representations of Latvia in Kaliningrad (5%) and Vitebsk (4%). From 1 April, visas are also being issued by the Embassy of Latvia in Egypt. Last year, tourism development and promotion was one of the Foreign Ministry priorities. The Ministry and diplomatic representations launched preparations for active tourism season as early as at the beginning of 2009, by laying down more flexible procedures for tourist visas, as well as introducing other significant easements for visa applicants. That includes, from 1 January 2009 onwards, the co-operation of the Latvian Embassy in Moscow with a provider of express mail services, Pony Express, to enable sending visa application from various regions of Russia to the Embassy of Latvia in Moscow. As the result, in the region of the CIS, covering Russia, Belarus and Ukraine, the numbers of visas issued by the representation of Latvia has increased by 5.5% if compared to December 2008. In 2008 %, 19 203 visas were issued to individuals stating tourism as their purpose of entry, but in 2009 the number of tourist visas increased to 20 261.
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