EU & Kazakhstan Acknowledge Progress in Visa Facilitation Talks

The EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen met with the President of Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev in Uzbekistan ahead of the inaugural Central Asia – European Union Summit.

During this meeting, both leaders acknowledged progress in visa facilitation negotiations between the EU and Kazakhstan, Schengen.News reports.

As Tokayev noted, Schengen visa facilitation is one of the four main priority areas in which his country is ready to strengthen cooperation with the bloc.

The same suggested that the start of the procedures for a visa facilitation agreement shows a growing and deeper engagement between Kazakhstan and the EU.

Kazakhstan has been pushing for some time now for the negotiations on the visa facilitation agreement with the bloc to be launched.

According to the Kazakhstan authorities, this agreement is very important for the country’s nationals.

Commenting on the matter, Kazakh Deputy Foreign Minister, Roman Vassilenko, said previously that the prompt start of the visa facilitation negotiation would be of mutual benefit.

Kazakhstan Wants EU to Issue Schengen Visas With Longer Validity & Facilitate Other Some Other Criteria
Under the visa facilitation agreement, Kazakhstan wants the EU to ease some of its Schengen visa application rules for Kazakh citizens.

As previously mentioned by the Kazakhstan authorities, the country wants the EU to reduce the visa application fee.

In addition, Kazakhstan also wants the EU to start granting Schengen visas with a longer validity period to its passport holders and process applications faster.

When making these requests, Kazakhstan ensured the EU that there is no risk of irregular migration once the visa rules are facilitated.

According to the Kazakh authorities, the country has taken all the necessary steps to ensure that those who enter the bloc as tourists return.

They also emphasised that Kazakhstan is open to cooperating in the readmission of its nationals who stay in the bloc irregularly without the needed documentation.

While the EU continues to require Kazakhstan passport holders to obtain visas in order to be permitted entry into the bloc, the case is not the same for EU nationals. EU passport holders are eligible for visa-free entry to Kazakhstan for short stays.

Nationals of Kazakhstan file a high number of Schengen visa applications every year. Statistics published by SchengenVisaInfo show that Kazakhstan nationals submitted a total of 159,072 applications for Schengen visas in 2023.

Of those who filed an application, 143,970 were granted a visa whereas 14,285 of them had their application rejected.

Source: https://schengen.news/eu-kazakhstan-acknowledge-progress-in-visa-facilitation-talks/