Major Oman tourism drive opens borders to 3 more nations

Muscat: Citizens of Iran, Russia and China have been added to the list of nationalities that can enter the Sultanate on a tourist visa without an Omani sponsor, the Royal Oman Police (ROP) has said. The ROP said in a statement on Monday: “Addition of the Republic of Iran, the Federal Republic of Russia and the People’s Republic of China to the list of countries that can benefit from a tourist visa to enter Oman without a local sponsor.”
An ROP official confirmed to the Times of Oman that from yesterday, nationals of these three countries do not need to have entry visas.
The facility is already in place for the citizens of the US, Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, or a Schengen agreement country. “The number of countries whose citizens can enter the country with a visa on arrival stands at 71, up from 68,” the official said.
Since March 21, applications for tourist visas and express visas to Oman have only been available online, with express counters at the new Muscat International Airport set up to deal with emergency cases.
Oman e-visa had announced in a statement at the time, “ROP hereby announce that as of Wednesday, March 21, 2018, applications for tourist and express visas will only be accepted online through the ROP site, and will not be received at the visa service desks.”
The e-visa service was introduced to prevent unnecessary queues at the visa-on-arrival desk at the airport’s counter, according to the statement released by the authorities.
“We are still keeping the visa-on-arrival option for a short span of time for people who are flying to Oman and are not aware of the new rule. The counter will then be moved once the message is sent across. But we highly recommend that all nationalities start applying for e-visas starting from today,” said a spokesman from the Oman Airports Management Company.
Major steps have been taken in this regard since the news of e-visas broke in January 2018.
Many travel agencies in Muscat have already asked their clients to obtain an electronic visa to avoid any complication at the immigration counters.