U.S. Homeland Safety Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas has stated the USA is contemplating including 4 international locations – one in all them being Cyprus – to its visa waiver program.
This program permits residents to return to America with no visa for a keep of as much as 90 days.
“We’ve got 4 candidates within the pipeline: Cyprus, Israel, Bulgaria and Romania,” Mayorkas stated on Wednesday at a journey trade occasion.
“We’re very, very targeted on this system,” he added, saying it supplies important financial and safety advantages.
In September, the USA added Croatia to the visa waiver program.
U.S. Journey Affiliation Chief Government Roger Dow stated on Tuesday including Croatia is a $100 million enhance to the U.S. financial system. “Every time you add one in all these international locations, the journey simply booms,” Dow stated.
In February, Mayorkas spoke with the European Fee’s Commissioner for Residence Affairs and each “expressed their continued curiosity in sustaining the U.S.-EU Passenger Identify Report Settlement and dealing with Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, and Romania to satisfy the {qualifications} for the Visa Waiver Program.”
To take part in this system, a rustic should meet necessities associated to counterterrorism, regulation enforcement, immigration enforcement, doc safety, and border administration.
There are at the moment 40 international locations in this system.
(Reuters)