A group of European countries has called on the EU to make it harder for Russians to holiday in Europe as the war in Ukraine grinds through a fifth year. EU interior ministers were discussing the issue, raised in a letter by Poland, Norway, the Baltic states and another nine members of the free-movement Schengen area, at a meeting in Luxembourg Thursday.JOIN US ON TELEGRAMFollow our coverage of the war on the @Kyivpost_official. “It has been deeply troubling to witness increasing numbers of Russian tourists enjoying leisure travel on European beaches and in European resorts while missiles and drones continue to strike civilians and civilian infrastructure in Ukraine,” read the letter seen by AFP. The bloc has suspended its visa facilitation agreement with Russia and last November moved to deny Russians multi-entry visas. The number of visas issued to Russians has dropped sharply from more than four million before the war to about half a million in 2024. Hawkish EU countries argue that is not enough and complain about an uneven application of the current rules across the bloc. More than 470,000 tourist Schengen visas were issued to Russian citizens in 2025, many multi-entry, according to the letter. “I want there to be no more shopping weekends. I want there to be no more fancy trips to Europe while Ukrainians are dying on the battlefield,” Sweden’s migration minister Johan Forssell told reporters arriving at the Luxembourg talks. “This situation is completely insane and it needs to be stopped.”