Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Brits toughen visa rules for Bolivia, Venezuela

British immigration authorities have strengthened the visa requirements for visitors from Bolivia and Venezuela.

According to officials, tourists from those countries will be forced to provide fingerprints and pay a fee to obtain a visa before entering Britain. The BBC News reported that those countries “failed a test of the threat posed by their citizens in terms of security, immigration and crime.”

Visa requirements were imposed on Brazil and Trinidad and Tobago last year though a spokeswoman for the Home Office told Bloomberg that those countries “have improved”.

British officials admitted that the visa requirements were placed on South Africa due to the “increasing risk from Islamic extremists using South Africa as a transit point and planning plots there.” Few specifics were provided as to why Bolivia and Venezuela were included:
The Ministry of Home Affairs stated in a notice that "the broadened request for visas is only one of a number of measures undertaken by the Government to reinforce border security and allow only for the entry into the country of those people that the United Kingdom wants and needs."
Image- The telegraph (“The biometrics program requires all UK visa applicants to provide fingerprints before arrival.”)
Online Sources- IHT, El Universal, BBC News, Bloomberg, U.K. Home Office

3 comments:

The Malcontent said...

It's a pretty big haul to get from Bolivia or Venezuela to the UK. Only the wealthy can afford to make such a trip. I guess I can't blame the UK, I wouldn't want a bunch of far-right weirdos coming in mucking up the country. That's what Miami is for!

Anonymous said...

Malcontent is correct. Only the well of can manage the trip from Venezuela or Bolivia to the UK. I guess that all the violence by the European white ruling classes in Bolivia in recent years as well as the student violence in Caracas in the last month was the last straw for the UK.

It's a pity that the best off and well educated in these two countries do not know how to behave since they can do what they want in theirt own countries with little risk of being prosecuted.

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