More than two dozen industrialized countries are expected to miss a US-imposed deadline for providing their citizens with computer-coded passports later this year, officials told Congress on Thursday.
That would leave State Department officials bracing for a surge in demand for visas from millions of travelers who would not normally need them to visit the US, the officials said on Thursday. Twenty-seven countries -- including Japan and 22 European nations -- must begin providing passports with facial-recognition technology by Oct. 26. Visitors from those countries who are issued passports without the technology after that date will be required to apply for visas to travel to the US. The rules were mandated by Congress as an anti-terrorism measure.
Maura Harty, assistant secretary of state for consular affairs, said nearly all of the countries would miss the deadline, including Japan, Britain, Germany and Italy. As a result, she said, demand for tourist visas would likely surge to about 12 million in the fiscal year 2005, from about 7 million in 2003, creating a workload that would likely swamp consular staff in US embassies and create significant visa backlogs.
"It's a frightening prospect," said Harty, who testified before the House Committee on Government Reform. She said the shift would significantly disrupt tourism and business travel from those countries. "In the short term we would see a serious impact," she said.
Harty said the passport deadline could only be extended by Congress. Her testimony high-lighted the difficulties being encountered by some Bush administration officials as they strive to put in place a new round of security measures designed to screen foreign visitors.
The officials emphasized in the congressional hearing that progress was being made. Asa Hutchinson, an undersecretary in the Department of Homeland Security, said that nearly 2 million foreign visitors traveling to the US with visas had been fingerprinted and photographed at 115 airports and 14 seaports since Jan. 5.
Hutchinson said the new program had allowed customs officials to identify and prevent more than 60 criminals from entering the country. "It's important to note that this serves as a deterrent as the word goes out that we have this capability," he said.
But he acknowledged that the government was still struggling to put in place a similar screening system at the nation's borders, where the vast majority of foreign travelers enter. Congress set a deadline of Dec. 31 for such security screening at the 50 busiest border posts.
Harty said the industrialized nations were working hard to get the technology in place. She said Japan and Britain expected to begin issuing computer-coded passports in late 2005; others expected to follow a year or so later.
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