EU visa process to be tightened to stem terrorist flow through Turkey

Turkey has traditionally been seen as a transit country with a large number of travelers from Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan using it as a stepping stone to access richer Western and northern countries. However, after radical Islamists attacked the satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo as a response to cartoons denigrating the Prophet Muhammad, concerns about Turkey turning into a transit point for radical Islamists who illegally enter Europe with the aim of getting involved in terrorist activities have escalated. Turkish officials claim there is no such risk as Turkey will be able to prevent the flow of illegal migrants at border gates. However, the EU has reportedly called a meeting with Turkey's EU Affairs Minister Volkan Bozkır in order to review the Schengen visa requirements. The EU aims to exercise more control at the borders in order to prevent terrorism. The call for the meeting was taken as an initial sign of the EU's desire to toughen the requirements of the Schengen visa, a move that will also pose problems for Turkish citizens. According to information obtained by Sunday's Zaman, as of June 2015 Turkish citizens are going to be compelled to enter the Europe only through the country where they obtained their visa. Turks are currently allowed to enter Europe through any Schengen country, regardless of which country issued the visa. For example, a Turkish citizen is allowed to go to Spain with a Schengen visa that was obtained from the Italian Embassy. The only exceptions to this scheme are visas for people seeking to visit Holland, Belgium and Germany, where there are approximately 3 million people of Turkish origin. On Dec. 16, 2013, Turkey and the EU signed a visa liberalization agreement in parallel with a readmission agreement that would allow illegal migrants who entered Europe via Turkey to be deported to Turkey. Turkey initialed the readmission agreement in 2011, but held off on signing it until the EU started talks on visa liberalization. The agreement was taken as a positive step by Turkish authorities on the grounds that its ratification would resolve the decades-long deadlock over visa requirements for Turkish citizens. Then-Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu said on Dec. 4, 2013, when announcing the deal at a press conference in Brussels, that the visa exemption for Turks would be effective in three to three-and-a-half years. Yet almost one-and-a-half years have passed since the agreement and there has been no progress. For Turkish citizens in particular, obtaining a visa from one of the 26 countries in the Schengen zone still remains a lengthy and often very pricey ordeal. In the process, up to 40 different documents have to be provided by the applicant -- and that still is no guarantee that a visa will actually be issued in the end.

The core of Europe's visa regime is called Schengen, which is based on two agreements from 1985 and 1990. The countries in the Schengen zone are Austria, Belgium, Czech, Republic, Denmark, Estonia Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and non-EU members Norway, Iceland and Switzerland. The UK and Ireland, though members of the European Union, are not part of the Schengen agreement. A Schengen visa obtained for one country is good for all countries in the arrangement, Today's Zaman informs.