Government revamping system by which visas are processed and issued

The government is in the process of launching a revamped system for the processing and issuing of visas as the cumbersome process is hindering the attraction of further investors and tourists to Malta, Foreign Affairs Minister George Vella announced today.

Vella was participating in a public consultation meeting, the first of a series of meetings organised by the Office of the Prime Minister as the Labour government marks its first 100 days in power.

Over 70 people were in attendance.

Today's meeting focused on foreign affairs and, as expected, the most pressing issue raised by the public was the processing and issuing of visas, which many described as "cumbersome".

Vella admitted that soon after his appointment as minister for foreign affairs, the majority of calls that came through his customer care office were related to visas.

"While one has to understand that part of the visa system is the vetting of the individuals applying, yet it is true that something is wrong with the present system," the minister said.

Strictly speaking, visas fall under the responsibility of the Ministry for Home Affairs. However, the two ministries have been working together to find ways of facilitating the process.

The biggest problems lay in the issuing of visas to Arab countries, Ukraine and Russia.

"But I can assure you that the Prime Minister has taken the matter into his hands and we are now prospecting a holistic system to make the process more expedite," he said.

Vella also announced that an audit report commissioned by the Foreign Affairs Ministry was in the process of being finalized. The audit report, which analyses the work of Maltese embassies abroad, will be ready by 15 June.

The minister said that while it was difficult to quantify the return of work carried out by his ministry, the government wanted to analyse the affect of investment which the government was making in its embassies abroad.

The audit is to analyse whether the government needed to increase or decrease the number of staff at embassies or whether any new embassies should be opened.

In reply to an intervention which questioned what support was Malta receiving from the European Union in terms of burden sharing, Vella said Malta would continue pushing for EU member states to recognize what big of a problem illegal immigration represented to the island.

"It is our duty to help and offer shelter to the migrants when they reach our shores and it is our duty to see that they are not exploited at work. At the same time, we will continue insisting with the EU that what might appear to be small numbers for them would have bigger affect on us," he said.

On the European Union's decision to lift the arms embargo against Syria, Vella said it did not affect Malta's neutrality status.