ASTANA (French Embassy) – Kazakhstan has extended a visa fee entry for foreign citizens from ten countries until July 2016, said French Ambassador Francis Etienne.

Francis Etienne

“Yesterday, we heard from our contacts in the Kazakh Ministry of Foreign Affairs, that it had been decided to extend a visa free rule for another year starting from July 15, 2015”, the diplomat said at a press conference in Astana on Wednesday.

However, Kazakhstan’s Foreign Ministry, however, told Interfax-Kazakhstan that the issue is still under consideration by the competent authorities. “As far as I know, the authorized agencies are still studying the effect of the initiative and a possibility of extending it”, Foreign Ministry spokesman Nurzhan Aitmakhanov said.

The Kazakh government granted a visa-free entry to the country for citizens from U.S., the Netherlands, Great Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Malaysia, UAE, South Korea and Japan in the period from July 15, 2014 to July 15, 2015. During this time, the citizens of these ten countries are allowed to stay in Kazakhstan without visa for 15 calendar days.

Visa is not required for citizens of following 16 countries/territories: Argentina, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Hong Kong, Mongolia, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Serbia, South Korea, Tajikistan, Turkey, Ukraine and Uzbekistan.

For a 1 month tourist visa, no letter of invitation is needed for national of one of 47 countries with easy visa procedure.