Kyrgyzstan to stop servicing Russia's Mir payment cards from this week

Mir payment cards, Moscow's alternative to Visa and Mastercard, have become more important since those U.S. companies suspended operations in Russia over the conflict in Ukraine and their cards issued in Russia stopped working abroad. Kyrgyzstan's move mirrors one made by Armenia, which stopped servicing Mir cards from March 30, and highlights the problem Russia faces in facilitating payments for its citizens abroad, even in countries that have not imposed sanctions against Moscow.

Russia's Mir payment cards will stop working in Kyrgyzstan from this week, the country's local payments operator said on Tuesday, citing the risk of secondary sanctions on its own payments infrastructure. Mir payment cards, Moscow's alternative to Visa and Mastercard, have become more important since those U.S. companies suspended operations in Russia over the conflict in Ukraine and their cards issued in Russia stopped working abroad.

Kyrgyzstan's move mirrors one made by Armenia, which stopped servicing Mir cards from March 30, and highlights the problem Russia faces in facilitating payments for its citizens abroad, even in countries that have not imposed sanctions against Moscow. Russia has been courting these "friendly" countries, but only a handful of nations actually accept Mir cards and banks in some countries have backtracked on facilitating Mir transactions.

"In order to minimise the risk of secondary sanctions, the Interbank Processing Centre (IPC), as guarantor of the smooth operation of the Elkart national payment system, informs about the halting of servicing Mir bank cards in its infrastructure from April 5, 2024, due to the termination of a mutual relationship with the NSPK," the IPC said in a statement. Russia's National Card Payment System (NSPK) said it had received warning from Elkart that Mir would stop working on April 3 in Kyrgyzstan.

The Bank of Russia's First Deputy Governor Olga Skorobogatova said the central bank was working on solving the problem with foreign banks' refusal to accept Mir cards with the help of Russian banks' foreign subsidiaries and the central bank's Faster Payments System (FPS), a financial messaging service.

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