Originally Posted by
racedo
Recent calls by President Putin were for different visa rules to boost tourism..
As for being intrusive I beleive UK embassy in Mosow operates similar if even harder requirement.
You tend to find that countries have very similar requirements for each other. If you look around slightly more widely you also tend to find that you can see whose "fault" it is. The results of that wider look around would be that in terms of paperwork we tend to be quite welcoming of tourists but quite suspicious of other people, and that in admin terms we tend to be a slight bit of a pain. A wider look also shows that Russia always tends to be a pain in every way possible...