About 150,000 Foreigners Applied for Participation in XIX World Youth Festival

Around 150,000 foreign nationals from 190 countries submitted bids for participation in the upcoming XIX World Festival of Youth and Students in the Russian resort city of Sochi, Grigory Petushkov, the chairman of the Russian national preparatory committee, said Friday.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — The XIX World Festival of Youth and students is scheduled for October 14-21, and expects to attract young specialists aged between 18 and 35 from different spheres worldwide. The event’s limit of participants is set at 20,000.

"The total figure, probably, has already exceeded 150,000 and now we have to choose 20,000 participants that will go to the festival from 150,000 of potential ones," Petushkov told reporters.

The organizer noted that some 120,000 bids were received online, while those remaining were still being submitted by the national preparatory committees of the event’s member states.

All accepted participants will be granted free Russian visas, Petushkov noted.

"The decision was made to issue preferential visas for the foreign nationals. The rules are the same as for the ordinary visas, however the visas will be free of charge for the delegations and participants of the festival," the organizer added.

In May, the event’s organizers told Sputnik that over 60,000 Russians had submitted participation bids for the festival.

Sochi was chosen to host the 2017 festival by the general assembly of the World Federation of Democratic Youth (WFDY) in 2015. The international festival has been taking place since 1947 and is organized by WFDY and the International Union of Students. The last festival was held in Quito, Equador, in late 2013. Moscow has already hosted the event twice: in 1957 and in 1985.