Economic reasons are the main obstacle for visa-free travel.
Economic reasons rather than security issues are the main obstacle to lifting visas for Croatian citizens who are travelling to the United States. Those Croats whose visa requests are denied are usually rejected because the US authorities have concluded that they do not have enough financial resources, a fulltime job or long-term housing in Croatia, and therefore believe there is a risk that a tourist visit might turn into a job search, reports Večernji List on February 26, 2018.
The total number of visa denials is not very high – about 400 applications are rejected annually, and it is interesting that most of them are submitted by Croatian citizens living in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia.
For a country to enter the visa-free travel programme with the United States, it is necessary to have the rate of rejected applications below three percent. The latest US government figures for 2017 show that the refusal rate for Croatia was 5.1 percent, the lowest since 2012. For comparison purposes, in 2016, the refusal rate was 6.78 percent. However, although the rate has been reduced, it has not reached anywhere near three percent.
Croatia fulfilled political and security criteria for the abolition of visas in 2011, with the signing of an agreement on the advancement of co-operation in the prevention and fighting serious crime. The fact that economic reasons are the main obstacle suggests that the period when the reason for the visas was (fake) Croatian passports issued to suspicious individuals from neighbouring countries is now behind us.
Croatia has not yet conducted an extensive survey of reasons why visas are being refused, but Interior Minister Davor Božinović recently attended meetings with US government officials in Washington, and it is expected that the study should be done soon in order to find out precisely what should be done for the visas to be abolished.
Some other countries which also need US visas, such as Romania, have launched media campaign explaining who has a chance to get a visa and who does not. In Croatia, the US Embassy regularly invites citizens to talk with a consul over social networks to get information about visas.
In addition to Croatia, citizens of Poland, Romania, Bulgaria and Cyprus also need a visa to go to the US. The European Parliament has asked the European Commission to impose reciprocity measures against the United States for discrimination against EU citizens, but the European Commission is not ready to launch a visa war which could, in addition to the political problems, cost millions of dollars in financial damages. The countries in question also do not support countermeasures – Poland is actively opposed, while Croatia says that it is better to deal with the issue by negotiations.
The number of issued non-immigrant visas, which allows people to stay in the US for up to 90 days, has been stable for years and ranges between 16,000 and 17,000 a year. Last year, 16,440 visas were issued, 16,939 in 2016, and 16,373 in 2015.
The number of immigrant visas is tiny – a total of 104 Croatian citizens received a visa for legal immigration last year, and 129 in 2016. The most substantial number of emigrants was recorded in 2006 when 212 people moved to the United States. Among immigrant visas, most have been issued for family reunification, while the number of visas granted for work is minimal. Last year, only eight Croatian citizens received an immigration visa because the US authorities had concluded that they needed them as workers or experts.
Translated from Večernji List (reported by Sandra Veljković).
