The member states’ representatives at the EU confirmed on Friday 30 June an agreement between the Maltese Presidency of the Council of the EU and representatives of the European Parliament on 29 June on the entry and exit system for non-EU travellers and the draft amendment to the Schengen Code to incorporate the new system into it.
In a press release, the Council of the EU said that a general agreement will be possible when all the technical issues have been settled. Unveiled in 2016 (see EUROPE 11526), the entry and exit system aims to register entry, exit and refusal to allow entry information on non-EU passport-holders crossing the Schengen Area’s external borders legally.
The system introduces technical innovations and hopes to reduce the verification times at borders, improve the quality of border controls by automatically calculating the authorised duration of stay in the EU for each traveller. The system is considered an important tool for detecting people outstaying their authorised stay and to fight terror by allowing the authorities to access travel details.
The entry/exit system apples to non-EU passport-holders whether they need a visa or not who are admitted to the EU for a stay of up to 90 days in a 180-day period. It will store information about their identity and travel documents and also biometric data (four fingerprints and a photograph of the face) but it will not apply to European travellers at this stage.
The data will be kept for border management purposes for a period of three years. This period will be extended to 5 years for persons on whom no information is available concerning their departure from the EU once the period of their authorised stay has expired.
The information stored in the entry/exit system will be accessible to border authorities, visa authorities and member states’ verification authorities for checking that non-EU passport-holders meet entry/exit requirements. The data in the entry/exit system will also be available for designated authorities and Europol to use to prevent, detect and investigate terrorist and other serious crimes.
In May, Parliament rapporteur Agustin Diaz de Mera (EPP, Spain) said he was ‘optimistic’ About the chances of agreement being reached before the summer break (see EUROPE 11786). (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)