Lithuania will close external service provider centers that accept migration documents in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan on November 1. A day before the announcement, Lithuania’s Migration Department said external service centers in Central Asia had stopped accepting new applications from residents seeking to come to the country for work after receiving a very high volume of employment applications. Lithuania had also exhausted its annual quota for foreign workers earlier in September.
Interior Minister Martynas Katelynas said the November 1 closures were prompted by security risks and the threat of terrorism. The centers act as intermediaries, accepting applications for Lithuanian residence permits and initiating migration procedures
Lithuania’s State Security Department has previously reported identifying individual members of the Central Asian community with radical views or links to terrorism. In its annual threat assessment, the agency also said that Islamic State Khorasan Province, or ISIS-K, has been recruiting followers within Central Asian diaspora communities in Europe. However, the agency said it considers it unlikely that Lithuania itself will become a direct target for Islamist terrorists in the near term.
The security decision comes as Lithuania has also reached its annual foreign-worker quota. The country set a quota of 24,706 foreign workers for 2026, which was officially declared exhausted on September 7. Once the quota is reached, a temporary residence permit based on employment remains available if the worker meets a higher salary threshold or belongs to certain high-value professions that are in shortage and meets the separate salary requirement for those professions.
As of September 1, nearly 227,000 foreign nationals held valid residence permits in Lithuania. They included around 13,000 Uzbek citizens and 7,400 Tajik citizens.
Demand for Lithuania has grown alongside broader interest in the European labor market. Between 2018 and 2024, the number of valid EU work permits held by Uzbek citizens increased roughly eightfold, those held by Kyrgyz citizens more than sevenfold, and those held by Tajik citizens more than fourteenfold. Poland has become one of the main destinations, Germany is expanding organized recruitment, and the UK has become an important source of seasonal work, while labor mobility programs are also emerging elsewhere in Europe.
Conditions are also changing in Russia, which for decades has absorbed most of the region’s labor migrants. Following the March 2024 Crocus City Hall terrorist attack, the authorities tightened migration rules, expanded registration requirements, and introduced greater digital monitoring of foreign workers.
In the first half of 2026, citizens of Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan made around 1.9 million entries into Russia declaring work as the purpose of their trip, down from more than 2.3 million a year earlier.
The decline does not mean that there is no longer dependence on the Russian labor market. In the first quarter of 2026, Russia accounted for 72.4% of cross-border remittances to Uzbekistan. In Kyrgyzstan, a March 2025 estimate put the number of citizens living abroad at roughly 600,000; around 380,000 were registered with Russian migration authorities at the end of 2024.
For Central Asian migrants, European migration is on a far smaller scale. In 2024, Central Asian citizens accounted for only around 1.5% of valid EU work permits issued to third-country nationals. Uzbekistan was the region’s largest source of labor for the EU; its citizens held nearly 38,000 valid permits and received more than 19,000 new ones.
The way people find work also differs. Many Central Asians have traditionally traveled to Russia independently and looked for jobs after arriving. Visa-free travel, the Russian language, direct transport links, and established diaspora communities lower the barriers to entry. Kazakh and Kyrgyz citizens can work in Russia without a work permit under Eurasian Economic Union rules, though hostility toward Central Asian migrants has increased markedly.
In the EU, the journey more often begins with a job vacancy. Employers select candidates in advance, while some professions require language skills and recognition of qualifications. Germany already uses this model with Uzbekistan, where candidates are recruited for specific jobs. In 2025, 1,755 Uzbek citizens legally started working in Germany, and in January 2026 Uzbekistan’s Migration Agency advertised more than 500 new vacancies alongside free German-language courses.
A study by the Prague Process Migration Observatory found that the most common sectors include construction, healthcare, tourism, and IT. Among the main challenges identified by the authors are the recognition of qualifications, long-term sustainability, and support for workers returning home.
A separate ICMPD Migration Outlook said large-scale increases in migration from Central Asia to the EU were unlikely in 2026 under current admission rules, although it expected gradual expansion as new programs and bilateral agreements develop.
For Central Asian workers, however, the search for jobs abroad is not limited to Europe. Uzbekistan is expanding organized employment programs in South Korea and Japan. South Korea operates the state-run Employment Permit System, or EPS; since 2007, nearly 50,000 Uzbek citizens have found jobs through the program. Korean employers are now also involved in training workers directly in Uzbekistan.
Kyrgyzstan works with employers in the Gulf states. In 2026, licenses for overseas recruitment covered destinations including Turkey and the Gulf countries. Tajikistan is also looking for employment opportunities in the Gulf states and East Asia.
Each labor market has its own specialization. The United Kingdom primarily recruits seasonal workers. Germany hires workers for specific occupations. South Korea uses a state-run system to select foreign workers: in 2026, Korean employers continued selecting Uzbek citizens through the SPAS electronic database. In the Gulf states, vacancies are available across sectors including construction and services.
As the geography of migration changes, so do preparations for departure. Dushanbe has a Migrant Resource Centre where prospective migrants receive information about legal migration channels and help with preparations for departure.
Kyrgyzstan has opened similar centers in Osh and Bishkek, with the Bishkek center starting operations in May 2026. A similar facility has operated in Tashkent since August 2025.
Checking vacancies, signing contracts, and completing language and professional training are increasingly taking place before workers leave home. Lithuania’s closures show that Central Asia’s migration shift away from Russia will not be straightforward. New destinations are opening, but they come with tighter entry rules and fewer informal routes into work.
