MasterCarrot

Thank you, hopefully we'll get some good news soon. I will also reach out with a similiar message to yours and try to get others to also reach out. Maybe if more people bring this issue to light they'll take it more seriously.

Yes we just saw the news. Honestly, we are in total shock. Everyone is shocked. This is just insane, there are so many people who will now be stranded and in horrible situations because of this.

Hello have there been any updates in your case? Were you able to transfer to Jerusalem?

Update: Jakarta has rejected us even with our explanation and their interview letter attached, we are now waiting on Vietnam, and Malaysia. I have filled out the form for my congressmans help and are waiting to hear a reply from him as well. Also around January his passport will have less than 6 months left on it which is a nice bonus because Belarus embassies also don't want to renew passports abroad and especially when the army is waiting for you back home.

Never considered this option, will look into this if the embassies around us in accessible countries don't reply.

We filled out our papers with the help of a lawyer who had told us to list every address we had been at for whatever time span was asked. At the nvc phase we basically went along with that principle. My husband can't return because of risk of being taken in for mandatory military service. Ironically we had waited so long for the i130 that now there really is no way he can go back. He used to be exempt because of his heart issues but now that also comes under question. There is also a chance that they can arrest him for showing support for something other than the current regime. So basically super risky. In Belarus the only real way to enter Poland is through a work permit but that's also not fool proof as people have been stopped and their polish "employers" would he called only to verify that the person does not actually work for said firm. It honestly seems like a no-win situation where you're always putting yourself at risk. Especially russian and belarusian men who are applying for the spouse visa. I could fly into Belarus at this moment and no one would care.

Thank You so much for your reply!! We will try to email the embassies provided and hopefully, someone will take us.

Hello, I will try to go through each question step by step; 1. When we applied to USCIS we lived in Indonesia, and we asked for our consulate to be in Warsaw, when applying and filling out papers for NVC our living address was in Georgia. 3. My husband cannot go back mostly due to mandatory army service, before the war he was exempt due to health issues, mostly with his heart. After the war had started the government had already tried to hand his parents a red slip for him to show up for army service a few times. The most recent was about a month ago when they tried to hand the slip to workers in their store. 5. We had tried to apply to Kazakhstan, Georgia, and Kyrgyzstan but got the same rejection from all of them basically saying that they only take residents. 6 We did not ask Jakarta to take us, they just sent us an interview letter with the date for our interview and we flew out to SE Asia to be closer to the Embassy. When I tried to apply for the medical, the hospital called the embassy, and then we received an email saying the embassy did not want to take us. We will try to write a formal request but we had replied to their email, twice explaining the situation but had basically only gotten a one-sentence reply saying "Send proof of residency". **We just really did not think that it was possible to get an interview letter and then run into this issue. We had assumed an interview letter meant that we were accepted and that was the end of the story. While trying to transfer our case we got the Interview letter and basically assumed that was that.

Fingers crossed, if the congressman's office does not reply I will send another inquiry on Monday. I guess the only thing left is to keep trying.

Update: Trying to talk to the embassy is like talking to a wall. I have explained the situation multiple times and they just respond with "Please send evidence of residency."

Hello, Originally we did our USCIS papers with a lawyer who told us that we needed to put down Warsaw as our embassy which is why we did it, he then said when the time came we would be able to transfer to another embassy. My husband does not have a Schengen and apparently, we cannot get it from any embassy not in Belarus which is insane. After waiting about a year and living in SE Asia we went to Georgia for a few months to wait it out and try to get into another embassy. Kazakhstan did not take us and we saw a lot of issues with getting visas from Israel from acquaintances and on forums, we had also lived in Turkey, Indonesia, and been in Dubai which are massively Muslim countries so Isreal would be a risk as in we were told they might not even let us in because of this. When our Embassy was assigned to Jakarta, I contacted NVC and explained the situation, i.e. that we only had visitor visas in Jakarta and needed help transferring our case to another embassy. They basically told me that they couldn't do anything because my husband does not have proof of residency in any other country. We sent our papers in, no where in the process did they ask for residency, Jakarta accepted all of our papers and even gave us an appointment day which is even crazier bc according to visa agencies in Indonesia (we had already talked to two agencies and a friend from Indonesia who helps get American visas) they shouldn't have even accepted our papers in the first place. Apparently, we could try to get him a work Visa but that would be seen as fraud since the work visa would come in after we even got an appointment date. I wrote to my congressman and am waiting for a reply hopefully but I think the only other option would be trying to get a residency or work/student permit in a country around us and transferring our case. We had spent so much money already on flights and Airbnbs that flying back anywhere would really start to run us dry. ***SORRY for the rant, I am just at a loss that all of this was allowed to happen and we were told they won't accept us when we tried to get a medical appointment when we had already traveled halfway across the world for this. This feels completely unethical from the US embassy side tbh...after multiple communications with NVC and no issues or questions from Jakarta we had assumed Jakarta had taken us in with good faith knowing the situation happening in eastern Europe.

We were there on a visitor Visa for about a year. We had never put down Jakarta as our embassy location and had put down Warsaw. When assigned to Jakarta, I even contacted NVC and explained the situation to which they told us that we could not change our Embassy. I had even written to Kazakhstan and tried to transfer but was refused. edit: at the time of applying we had lived in 3 other countries. After all of this we had come to the conclusion that the US had probably just chosen the embassy which accepted us.

Thank you, I didn't even realize im just writing all of this through tears right now trying to figure something out.

Hello, we had already been assigned a date for our interview and we tried to book a medical appointment. The interview was supposed to be on October 5th. The hospital messaged the Embassy and the Embassy ended up sending us an email that they won't take us because we don't have residency in Indonesia. However, we had never specified Jakarta as our embassy the US government assigned them to us. Our case number is: JAK_____

Hello, My husband is from Belarus. Even though we had put down the Polish Embassy at the start of the process we were assigned the Jakarta Embassy. We had tried to change embassies but no one would take us. We had been sent an interview date and flew to SE Asia to get ready for the interview. Now, they do not want to take us saying they don't take anyone who does not have a residency permit. We are at a loss on what to do. No other embassy wants to take us, my husband cannot come back home to his country, and he does not have residency anywhere. He has been flying around the world waiting for our application to get accepted for all this time. Please help, any advice would be amazing.

Hello, my husband is from Belarus getting a shengen is near impossible unless its a work visa. Before the war in Ukriane our default embassy was Poland. We had originally thought we would be trying to transfer from Poland and did not expect to get Jakarta. We had Bali to Georgia because we had heard that a lot of russians and belarusian had luck transferring their case to Kazakhstan. I guess in hindsight we should have stayed in East Asia but who would have known. Edit: sorry I'm just trying to fit a ton of information which may help so maybe it sounds like im blabbering.

Hello, we have finally gotten an approval after a year wait and have run into a bit of a pickle. When I was applying for my husband we were in Bali on a 1 year visitor visa. We had just gotten our NVC welcome letter and our embassy is listed as Jakarta. How valid is this decision? And is there a way to change it, if so at what point should I try to change our embassy. We are currently in Georgia for the last 2 or so months and have heard that people had luck with Kazakhstan and Israel. My husband's English is not that bad and I feel that if needed we can try to transfer to a country where the interview will be held in english. Please, also advice which embassies are the best to try and transfer to where he won't need a visa. Thank you!