On Wednesday 22 December, the European Commission published its annual report on visa reciprocity with the United States which, despite improvements for Poland and Croatia in 2021, continues to require visas for nationals of three Member States: Bulgaria, Cyprus and Romania.
The European Commission reports on its exchanges with the US administration on this subject and on the various events of the year, such as the legal action that was brought against it by the European Parliament in respect of its inaction on reciprocity last March. It reiterated its opposition to a delegated act that suspended the visa-free regime for US citizens to enter the EU.
It also explains why these three member countries still retain a different regime. The rates of false asylum claims by nationals from these countries in the US are still too high. The tolerated threshold for refusal of such applications is 3%, but Cyprus has reached 6.21% and more than 10% and 12% in 2020 for Bulgaria and Romania, with the European Commission referring to “record rates” of refusals.
Link to the communication: https://bit.ly/3H89KB4 (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)