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The European Commission on Wednesday called for the introduction of prior security checks for visa-free travellers entering the EU’s passport-free Schengen zone in order to prevent potential terrorist threats.
If the proposal is approved, citizens of Balkan countries that do not need visas to travel to Western Europe will have to undergo online security checks.
The new system, called the European Travel Information and Authorisation System, ETIAS, would oblige travellers to fill in an online application providing basic data such as information on their identity, travel documents, residence and contact details.
Each application will be automatically processed, checking the applicants through different databases, including INTERPOL and EUROPOL.
Those who pass the security check will get travel authorization “within minutes after the application has been submitted”, according to the Commission.
The ETIAS is being introduced to enable “more efficient management of the EU’s external borders and improve internal security, whilst at the same time facilitating legal travel across Schengen borders,” the Commission said.
“ETIAS is the missing link in our border management, connecting the dots with our migration and security policies and enhancing Schengen entry for at least 95 per cent of visa-free travellers. Europe’s openness does not come at the cost of its security,” the Migration and Home Affairs Commissioner, Dimitris Avramopoulos, said in a press release on Wednesday.
The planned introduction of security checks follows a series of terrorist attacks within the EU including a series of coordinated massacres in Paris in November 2015, which killed 130 people.
“Terrorists and criminals don’t care much for national borders. The only way to defeat them is by working together effectively. ETIAS will help do that: by spotting problem individuals and stopping them from coming, we’ll enhance Europe’s internal security,” the Commissioner for Security Union, Julian King, said in a statement.
The introduction of new authorization system for visa-free third country nationals is not a new idea. Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker unveiled the idea in September in his State of the Union address.
“We need to know who is crossing our borders. By November, we will propose an automated system to determine who will be allowed to travel to Europe. This way we will know who is travelling to Europe before they even get here,” Junker said at the time.
