UK visa priority services suspended amid Russia-Ukraine crisis
Premium- The decision is taken as the UK immigration department is currently prioritising applications made under the Ukraine family scheme
The UK visa and immigration authority has decided to temporarily stop priority and super priority visa services for new study, work and family applications.
The decision is taken as the UK immigration department is currently prioritising applications made under the Ukraine family scheme, following its launch and in response to the humanitarian crisis arising from the invasion of Ukraine.
The immigration department has also informed that customers with standard visa applications may face a delay in processing.
"We are still currently unable to offer priority visa for visitor applications in Nigeria. Standard visitor visa applications are currently taking an average of six weeks to process," the visa department said in a statement.
However, in cases where there are extremely compassionate or compelling circumstances like medical emergencies. the UK immigration and visa authorities my consider expediting specific cases. The department said the bar for such cases is very high and applications will be assessed on a case-by-case basis.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson had recently said Britain needed to carry out security checks on Ukrainian refugees, after facing calls to relax visa conditions for those fleeing relentless bombardment by invading Russian forces.
Unlike many countries elsewhere in Europe that have accepted Ukrainian refugees without visas, Britain has required them, and there has been widespread criticism that this procedure has been too slow and bureaucratic.
Britain has granted over 950 visas to Ukrainians since the start of the war. By comparison, Poland, a neighbour of Ukraine, has taken in more than 1.2 million Ukrainians.
Earlier on Wednesday, Ukraine's ambassador to London called on the British government to relax visa conditions for people in what has become the fastest and biggest flow of refugees in Europe since World War Two.
Johnson told parliament the visa checks were needed because the Kremlin had singled out Britain over its stance on the crisis in Ukraine.
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