Embassy report: Tajik visa in Washington DC

[Lorence]

You can't get visa on arrival in Samarkand and as a Canadian you need a LoI for any kind of Uzbek visa.

Read the visa pages here and a lot of questions will be answered.

All of my questions were regarding the tajik visa. Not the uzebk visa. Sorry if that wasn't clear, thought it was given the forum is about the tajik embassy in DC.

[bwv812]

All of my questions were regarding the tajik visa. Not the uzebk visa. Sorry if that wasn't clear, thought it was given the forum is about the tajik embassy in DC.

Sorry, my mistake.

A visa for your next country isn't required in order to get an Uzbek visa, especially since they have no fixed exit port (you could just tell them you're exiting to Kyrgyzstan, where you don't need a visa).

In the past the ZTDA has provided individuals with letters of invitation free of charge, but their website currently makes no mention of it.
https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowTopic-g ... istan.html
http://www.ztda-tourism.tj/en/feedback/ ... ageId/448/

As for whether you actually need a LoI to get your visa from the DC embassy, it's probably best to email or call them for clarification. Their requirements on their website are a bit opaque. I'm not sure you will be able to get a GBAO permit from them, as my impression is many embassies outside Central Asia do not issue them. Perhaps doing your trip in reverse and starting in Bishkek will make things easier, as visa + GBAO is dead easy in Bishkek.

[abombardier]

Hi everyone,

A little update from March 2016 from 2 Canadians for the Tajik embassy in Washington D.C.:

-Costs: GBAO permit 50$ USD, Tourist visa 25$ USD. Payments made by bank drafts (they asked us for a separate 75$USD bank draft for each person).

-We called to confirm the need of LOI and unfortunately they still ask for it. So we did it just to avoir any delays.

-We sent all the documents and passeports in one Fedex enveloppe and enclosed one eveloppe for the return.

-Processing time very fast! We sent the Fedex enveloppe on Monday night and on Friday morning of the same week, we had the passeports back with the visas and GBAO permits! So they do issue GBAO permits!

-We sent a general travel itinerary with the documents. Date and name of cities we are planning to visit. No hotel names or anything. We did mention the name and contact inofrmation of the hotel in Dushanbe we wanted to stay at on the visa application, but this is the only place we mentioned hotel.

Please contact me for any other questions!

Regards,

Amélie

[SHK]

Just received my Tajikistan visa with GBAO permit this past Monday from the Washington DC embassy. Everything went smoothly. It took about 10 days from mailing the application to receiving the visa. I used USPS. My application included:

A letter with a very general itinerary & dates, for which I was planning to be in Tajikistan.
Two application forms.
A money order for $75 for the fees for the tourist visa and GBAO permit.
Two passport photos.
My U.S. passport.
A copy of the first page of my passport.
A self-addressed return envelope.
A copy of my flight itinerary into / out of Bishkek.
A hotel reservation for Dushanbe (made on booking.com, can be canceled w/o charge)

[steven]

Interesting! So no LOI this time?

[SHK]

Didn't need a LOI. Everything went surprisingly smooth.