The US Embassy announced here yesterday that travellers from 27 countries included in the Visa Waiver Programme will be affected by several changes concerning passports valid for travel to the United States.
Starting October 26, all Visa Waiver Programme (VWP) travellers must present a machine-readable passport to enter the United States without a visa.
Each traveller will be required to have a machine-readable passport and children will not be able to travel on their parents' passports.
The following 27 countries are included in the VWP: Andorra, Austria, Australia, Belgium, Brunei, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Monaco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, San Marino, Singapore, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.
Passports that are not machine-readable will not be valid for VWP travel and VWP nationals will need to either replace their non machine-readable passports with a machine readable one or obtain a US visa.
Some VWP countries will continue to produce non machine-readable passports at their consular sections abroad and their nationals residing abroad will be unable to obtain a machine-readable passport and will need a visa to enter the United States.
In the meantime, the US government has extended – for one year, to October 26, 2005 – the requirement for the 27 VWP countries to issue biometrically enabled passports. Passports issued on or after that date will be required to be biometrically enabled to be valid for use in the VWP.
A biometric passport will use facial recognition technology stored in a computer chip embedded in the passport to confirm the passport holders' identity to facilitate international travel.
For more information on the VWP, visit http://travel.state.gov/visa/tempvisitors_novisa_waiver.html
For more information on travel to the United States, visit www.dhs.gov/us-visit
CONDITIONS
27 countries included in the VWP
• Travellers from 27 countries under the Visa Waiver Programme should have a machine-readable passport to enter the US from October 26.
• That means children will not be able to travel on their parents' passports.
• Those who do not have a machine-readable passport will have to obtain a visa.
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