March 26, 2004

US Tightens Rules on Foreign Visitors

Last Friday, the U.S. announced that non-immigrant visitors from nearly all countries will be required to be fingerprinted and photographed upon arrival.

While participants in the visa waiver program will be able to travel to the U.S. without a visa, they will need to meet the same requirements as all other visitors.

Thus, DHS will process VWP travelers in US-VISIT, beginning 09/30/04, at all air and sea ports. This expansion of US-VISIT is related to the joint DHS and DOS request to Congress to extend for two years, the 10/26/04 deadline for VWP machine readable passports that include biometrics, and for DHS biometric passport readers to be at all ports of entry.

This extension will affect many close allies of the United States, including Australia, Britain and Japan.

However, Asa Hutchinson, undersecretary for borders and transportation security, (DHS) says, "[we hope] that the international community will understand our new system. This step is designated to make sure the security issues will be addressed. This will be a measure to identify terrorists."

"We believe that an extension of the visa waiver program will avoid potential disruption to international travel and at the same time enrolment in US-VISIT will help mitigate the security concerns related to extending the deadline for biometric passports," says Adam Ereli, deputy State Department spokesman.

As of September 30, individuals from the following countries will be required to be photographed and fingerprinted upon entry into the U.S.: Andorra, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Britain, Brunei, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Monaco, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, San Marino, Singapore, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.

Citizens of Canada and Mexico will not be affected by this change in process.

The US-VISIT program requires all foreigners entering the U.S. to provide digital fingerprints and a photograph upon entry to verify their identities and was implemented after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks to ensure security within American borders.

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