On Monday evening, the US authorities announced a tightening of the visa regime. As US Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security Asa Hutchinson said, from January 1, 2004, all foreigners entering the country on visas will undergo fingerprinting. In addition, at customs in seaports and airports, their documents will be scanned, they will be forcibly photographed and checked for links to terrorist organizations. To introduce the new immigrant tracking system, the US Congress has already allocated $380 million.
To enter the United States, tourists will also be required to indicate citizenship, country of permanent residence, nationality and the address where they intend to stay in the US. However, according to officials, no additional problems should arise for travelers. “In 99.9% of cases, visitors will simply be wished a pleasant journey,” Hutchinson explained. “But our security system will become more comprehensive, something it has lacked for too long.”
These measures, he said, will prevent terrorists from entering the country's territory. According to the AP agency, the White House believes that such a system could have prevented the tragedy of September 11. “Border security is not just the coastline,” Hutchinson said. “Computers should contain complete information about who is on the territory of the state, why, and in what direction they are moving around the country.”
These measures will affect everyone except citizens of 27 countries (including Canada and many European states), who are allowed to enter the United States without a visa. Perhaps the system for controlling visa entrants will expand even further in the future. All information will be stored in a special department, whose staff will analyze the data and, if any suspicious cases are found, transfer the files of these tourists to law enforcement agencies. At the same time, Hutchinson assured that there will be no total state control over immigrants: the US does not intend to play “Big Brother”.
Earlier, only citizens of a few countries that the US considered likely sources of terrorists were subjected to mandatory fingerprinting, especially men aged 16 to 25. But even in that case, most human rights organizations called the actions of the American authorities humiliating. However, now that the procedure will apply to all visa entrants without exception, representatives of migration authorities believe this will, on the contrary, eliminate discrimination. True, it may take a very long time to fine-tune the system: too much information about too many people will have to be processed. Last year, 23 million tourists entered the United States on visas, accounting for 60% of the total number of foreign visitors.