US Embassy in Ukraine Opening

[Cristian81 0]

Hello Folks,

Does anybody have any information on when the US embassy in Ukraine will reopen? They closed on November 16th and as of now (1/15/2020) they remain closed. Any information will be appreciated.

 

Thanks! 

[Crazy Cat 39,461]

****Moved to the Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus regional discussion area***

[Myroslava 21]

On 15.01.2021 at 6:50 PM, Cristian81 said:

Hello Folks,

Does anybody have any information on when the US embassy in Ukraine will reopen? They closed on November 16th and as of now (1/15/2020) they remain closed. Any information will be appreciated.

 

Thanks! 

 

They are working with reduced staff and processing a very limited amount of visas. https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/legal/visa-law0/visa-statistics/immigrant-visa-statistics/monthly-immigrant-visa-issuances.html

 

Here you can find data for December 2020. Several CR-1/IR1 were issued then. That means they didn't halt the process completely. I am having my interview in 2 weeks.

 

 

[Antonina 3]

Guys, let's help with this petition

 

https://www.change.org/p/president-joe-biden-fix-the-broken-consular-immigration-process?recruiter=false&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=facebook&utm_campaign=psf_combo_share_initial&recruited_by_id=36f9b430-829e-11eb-bd24-8b775c265252&utm_content=fht-27646555-en-us%3A2

[Keithn85 400]

Kyiv US Embassy announced they would start slowly processing immigrant visas again.  So for me since they were processing here and there, this is an excellent sign for the future.

 

Taken from the Ukraine US embassy site:

Starting April 1, the Embassy will offer appointments in every immigrant visa category, including K visas and diversity visas. The number of appointments available will be extremely limited until conditions significantly improve, and it will take time to clear the backlog of immigrant visa cases. Even though appointments are now available, it does not mean you will be immediately successful in booking an appointment.

[uapilot 60]

Any idea if this new quarantine in Kyiv from March 20th-April 9th will affect interviews on those days? My assumption is no since they don't seem to rely on those quarantine measures for their opening/closing decisions, but maybe I'm being too hopeful.

[Keithn85 400]

On 3/18/2021 at 5:54 AM, uapilot said:

Any idea if this new quarantine in Kyiv from March 20th-April 9th will affect interviews on those days? My assumption is no since they don't seem to rely on those quarantine measures for their opening/closing decisions, but maybe I'm being too hopeful.

I scanned the US embassy site because that definitely made me wonder.  How i see it, the embassy has been processing visas throughout this entire time, but just not announcing it.  So if it was going to truly affect the embassy, I figure they would post it on the site.  Basically, I would treat it as if it is December, except they announced they are processing.  

Out of all this, let us know how your interview goes.  That is the mentality I am going to encourage you to take.  If Kyiv was on full lockdown then I would understand the concern.

I reread the announcement from the 19th again while typing.  I would not include the US embassy in this unless they specifically say.  I would be surprised if they suspended interviews for these 2 weeks.

I bought my tickets to fly in in the 26th a couple weeks ago.  We did not expect this restriction during that time and she was really sad when she called me on Friday.  It is going to be a fun week and a half compared to what we were planning, but it will still be awesome spending time with the fiancee.  

Post here when you finish the interview on Friday!

Edited March 22, 2021 by Keithn85
late post. Forgot to finish a thought

[uapilot 60]

13 hours ago, Keithn85 said:

Post here when you finish the interview on Friday!

You got it!

It's funny, the year leading up to the interview scheduling was tough, but we were sort of in marathon mode, pacing our anxiety. Now with the interview scheduled, the anxiety is killing us. 😂 I immediately started coming up with a mental list of all the things that could go wrong, even though the worst thing that could happen is that we just go back to waiting for an interview again.

[Keithn85 400]

5 minutes ago, uapilot said:

You got it!

It's funny, the year leading up to the interview scheduling was tough, but we were sort of in marathon mode, pacing our anxiety. Now with the interview scheduled, the anxiety is killing us. 😂 I immediately started coming up with a mental list of all the things that could go wrong, even though the worst thing that could happen is that we just go back to waiting for an interview again.

I completely understand.  We had that discussion at the beginning (well for us the entire preparing process started in december) and I am preparing myself for those nervous calls about post NOA2 process.  It is going to be hard to gauge when everything will happen, but I plan to fly out before the interview, just to ease her nerves.  And I am basically going to pass on the awesome knowledge posters on here created to aid her in the interview.

[Traveler101 16]

My mother just had her reissue via interview today. I scheduled it at the end of February. 

[uapilot 60]

On 3/22/2021 at 3:40 AM, Keithn85 said:

Post here when you finish the interview on Friday!

Approved! I'll post an embassy review shortly after my fiance stops jumping up and down long enough to tell me what they asked during the interview.

 

Protip: you'll earn bonus points with the FSO if you follow the instructions and crop your 50x50mm photos before the interview and write the person's name on the back of them.