Germany to relax visa rules for Russian workers despite spy warning

Germany’s interior minister, Nancy Faeser, and Thomas Haldenwang, the head of Germany’s domestic intelligence agency, which last week warned about the security risk posed by Russian workers. Photograph: Bernd von Jutrczenka/AP

Germany is to relax visa requirements for skilled workers from Russia, just as the country’s domestic intelligence agency warned of a heightened risk that Russian nationals working for German firms could be recruited for industrial espionage.

The chancellor Olaf Scholz’s government is streamlining the visa application process by exempting Russian workers with specialised expertise in areas such as IT and communication technology from case-by-case assessments through the federal employment department.