On 8 December, the German Presidency of the Council of the EU and the European Parliament reached interim agreement on the draft Regulation amending the Regulation on the Visa Information System (VIS).
The Council of the EU said in a statement that there are still technical elements that need to be negotiated, but that they should be completed before the end of the year.
The purpose of the Regulation is to make the procedure for issuing short-stay visas more secure, include long-stay visas and residence permits in the VIS database, and ensure interoperability between the VIS and other EU systems and databases.
Registering these documents in a centralised database will help the authorities to check that they are authentic and valid.
One of the aims of the Regulation is to make it easier to return illegally resident citizens of non-Member States whose data may be stored in the VIS. In addition, before a visa or residence permit is issued, the new rules will allow enhanced background checks of the applicant to be carried out in the relevant databases.
In order to combat child trafficking, the new regulation will lower the age for fingerprinting children from 12 to 6 years of age. An upper limit will also be introduced: fingerprints of individuals over the age of 75 will not be included in the VIS.
The Council of the EU adopted its position in December 2018 (see EUROPE 12163/17) and the Commission submitted its proposal in May 2018 (see EUROPE 12021/6). (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)