US STATE DEPARTMENT INSTRUCTIONS FOR PARTICIPANTS
The Diversity Immigrant Visa Program was created by mandate of the U.S. Congress and is conducted annually by the U.S. State Department. It is implemented in accordance with the provisions of Section 203(c) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA). Section 131 of the Immigration Act of 1990 (Pub. L. 101-649) provides for amendments to Section 203 to create a new category of immigrants - the so-called diversity immigrants (DV). The law provides for the annual reservation of 50,000 visas for permanent residence for nationals of countries with low levels of immigration to the United States.
The annual DV program provides for granting permanent resident status to persons who meet simple but strict selection criteria. Applicants seeking DV visas are selected through a random drawing conducted by computer. Visas, however, are distributed among six geographic regions, with more visas directed to regions with low levels of immigration to the United States. Countries from which more than 50,000 immigrants have arrived in the United States over the past five years will not receive visas. No single country may receive more than 7% of DV visas issued in any one year.
Due to growing demand, the State Department this year has strengthened hosting and tripled the number of servers on which the registration website is hosted. In addition, persons registering for participation in DV-2007 will receive a registration confirmation indicating their first and last name, date of birth, country from which they are claiming, as well as the time and date of registration after the information they provide has been properly recorded on the website.
There is no fee for participating in the visa lottery. The State Department does not endorse, recommend, or support the use of any information or materials from external sources. The State Department is aware that some websites and email servers pose as official partners of the diversity immigrant visa lottery. Registration for participation in this lottery through the official U.S. government website (www.dvlottery.state.gov) is free, and notifications to winners are sent only by mail.
The DV-2007 program is already the third lottery for which electronic registration is required. Applications for participation in the visa lottery printed on paper and sent by regular mail are not accepted.
Participant Requirements
* The applicant must be a native of one of the countries eligible to participate in the lottery.
In most cases, this means the country in which the applicant was born. However, there are two additional situations that entitle the applicant to participate in the lottery.
First, if a person was born in a country whose natives are not eligible to participate in DV-2007, but his spouse was born in a country whose natives are eligible to participate in the lottery, he may claim the country of birth of his spouse, provided that both the applicant and his spouse are issued visas and enter the United States simultaneously.
Second, if a person was born in a country whose natives are not eligible to participate in DV-2007, but neither of his parents was born in that country or resided there permanently at the time of his birth, he may claim the country of birth of one of his parents, if natives of that country are eligible to participate in the visa lottery.
Natives of the following European countries are not eligible to participate in the lottery this year: the United Kingdom, Poland, and Russia.
* The applicant must meet the education or training requirements set forth in the DV-2007 terms.
To participate in the lottery, the applicant must have either a secondary school education or its equivalent, which means successful completion of a 12-year course of primary and secondary education, or 2 years of work experience within the last five years in an occupation requiring 2 years of professional training or at least 2 years of work experience. The U.S. Department of Labor's electronic database will be used to determine work experience requirements.
If the applicant does not meet these requirements, he or she should not submit an application for the 2007 visa lottery.
Procedure for Submitting the Application
* The State Department will accept only completed electronic registration forms for participation in the 2007 visa lottery submitted via the website (www.dvlottery.state.gov) only during the registration period beginning October 5 and ending December 4, 2005.
* If more than one application is submitted on behalf of a single applicant, regardless of who submitted them, they will not be considered. Applicants may prepare and submit their applications themselves or entrust this to someone else.
* Successful registration of an application will be confirmed by displaying on the screen the relevant information, including the applicant's first and last name, date of birth and country, as well as the date and time of registration. The applicant may print this confirmation for their own records.
* The application will not be considered if all required photographs are not provided. Recent photographs of the applicant, his or her spouse, and each child under 21 years of age, including all biological children, as well as all legally adopted and foster children (except children who are already U.S. citizens or are lawfully permanent residents of the United States), must be submitted electronically and in the prescribed format, even if they do not currently reside with the applicant or their immigration through the lottery is not planned. Group or family photographs are not accepted; individual photographs for each family member are required.
Digital images must meet the following requirements.
* Format: JPEG.
* The image must be either color or grayscale; monochrome images (with a two-level color depth - one bit per pixel) will not be accepted.
* If a new digital photograph is taken, its resolution must be 320 pixels in height by 240 pixels in width, and the color depth must be either 24-bit color, 8-bit color, or 8-bit grayscale.
* If a printed photograph is scanned, its dimensions must be 50x50 mm. It must be scanned at a resolution of 150 dots per inch (dpi), and the color depth must be either 24-bit color, 8-bit color, or 8-bit grayscale.
* The maximum image size is 62,500 bytes.
The application will not be considered if the submitted digital images do not meet the requirements set forth below.
* The applicant, spouse, and child must look directly at the camera; the head of the person being photographed must not be tilted to the side or turned up or down and must occupy approximately 50% of the area of the photograph.
* Photographs must be taken against a light neutral background. Photographs on a very dark background, a background with a decorative or other pattern, or a background cluttered with details will not be accepted.
* Photographs in which the image is out of focus will not be accepted.
* Photographs in which the person is wearing dark glasses or has any other adornment on his or her face will not be accepted.
* Photographs in which applicants are wearing a head covering will be accepted only if the wearing of the head covering is for religious beliefs, but even in that case the head covering must not obscure any part of the face.
Application Submission
For participation in the 2007 visa lottery, there is only one method. Applicants must submit an application on the electronic form that is available only on the website www.dvlottery.state.gov. Partially completed forms will not be considered. Applicants must provide the following information:
1. Full name - last name, first name, patronymic.
2. Date of birth - day, month, year.
3. Gender - male or female.
4. Place of birth - city or other locality.
5. Country of birth (the name of the applicant's country of birth must be given in its current spelling).
6. Photograph of the applicant.
7. Postal address - house number, street, city/locality, district, region, postal code, country.
8. Telephone number (optional).
9. Email address (optional).
10. Country whose citizens may participate in the lottery, if the applicant does not reside in the country of birth. If the applicant indicates citizenship of a country that qualifies for the lottery but is not the country of birth, this must be indicated in the application.
11. Marital status - single, married, divorced or in the process of divorce, widowed.
12. Number of unmarried children under 21 years of age - excluding children who are lawful permanent residents of the United States or are U.S. citizens.
13. Information about the spouse - full name, date of birth, gender, place of birth (city or other locality), country of birth, photograph.
14. Information about children - full name, date of birth, gender, place of birth (city or other locality), country of birth, photograph.
Note: The information provided must include the full name, date and place of birth of the spouse and all biological children of the applicant, as well as all legally adopted and foster children under 21 years of age and unmarried (except children who are already U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents of the United States), even if the applicant is no longer legally married to the child's parent, and even if the spouse or child does not currently reside with the applicant and/or will not immigrate.
It should be noted that married children and children over 21 years of age cannot participate in the visa lottery. If the applicant does not list all children, his or her application will not be considered.
Selection of Applicants
Applicants will be selected randomly by computer from all eligible applications submitted. Selected applicants will be notified by mail between May and July 2006 and will receive further instructions, including information on the fees associated with immigration to the United States.
Individuals not selected will not receive notifications. U.S. embassies and consulates are not able to publish lists of selected applicants.
Spouses of selected applicants and their unmarried children under the age of 21 may also apply for a visa to accompany or join the principal applicant. The issuance of visas under the 2007 visa lottery will take place from October 1, 2006 to September 30, 2007.
To obtain a visa, applicants selected by computer must meet all requirements provided by US law. Processing of applications and issuance of visas to selected applicants and their eligible family members must be completed by midnight on September 30, 2007. After that date, visa issuance will be terminated in any case, no adjustments will be possible, and family members of selected applicants will not be able to receive visas to accompany or join them.
Important note
No fee is charged for participation in the annual visa lottery. The US government does not use the services of any external consultants or private agencies to conduct the visa lottery. Any intermediaries and other persons offering applicants assistance in preparing documents do so without the authority and consent of the US government. The applicant must decide for himself whether to use the services of any external intermediary or external assistance to prepare the visa lottery application.
All properly completed applications submitted electronically directly by eligible applicants have the same chances of being selected by computer at the Kentucky Consular Center as applications submitted electronically through a paid intermediary. Each application received during the lottery registration period has an equal chance of being selected within its region. However, if more than one application is received from the same person, that person will not be allowed to register, regardless of the source of these applications.