During the meeting, the SBU head emphasized that he supports the initiative of the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry on the need to reduce visa procedures and mechanisms. In his opinion, a joint visa committee or expert group consisting of diplomats from different countries should be created and invited to Ukraine so that they can see how certain 'discreditation of the visa agreement' is carried out, and the simplest visa procedures are complicated.
'We are ready to provide our representative and show facts of corruption both of the internal troops, who let people into consulates for money, and technical staff, our people who take money, and intermediaries, and anyone the Europeans want to see,' said Valentyn Nalyvaichenko.
According to him, these materials will help representatives of European countries see the real situation during visa processing. In the opinion of the SBU head, this situation arose because clear and transparent visa procedures were not developed.
Recall that in January, the Verkhovna Rada ratified an agreement on a simplified visa regime between Ukraine and the European Union. The ratification of the agreement aims to consolidate on a contractual and legal basis the regime of travel of Ukrainian citizens to EU member states, as well as to establish a simplified and unified procedure for considering requests and making decisions on issuing visas to Ukrainians. In October 2007, the European Parliament ratified agreements between the European Union and Ukraine on simplifying the visa regime and on readmission (acceptance and transfer of persons illegally staying in the territory of the state). In June 2007, Ukraine signed agreements with the EU on the visa regime and readmission.