US visa fingerprinting, scanning to come

Be prepared to be finger printed and your face scanned in order to get a US visa in 2004 from the US Embassy in Port-of-Spain.

These are two stringent measures being taken by US immigration officials to secure its borders and protect its citizens, a senior US Embassy official said yesterday. Eugene Sweeney Consul General at the US Embassy on Marli Street told businessmen at the monthly meeting of the American Chamber of Industry and Commerce (Amcham) at the Hilton Trinidad these security measures were going to be implemented in 2004. “We have to be careful about protecting our borders and the security of US citizens,” he said, noting that it was also their duty to protect the job market from illegal immigrants. All airports in the US will soon have self-automated booths where persons entering the US are going to have their fingerprints cross-checked and verified, he said. 

Sweeney said the whole process should not last more than 30 seconds, stressing that the measures were also designed to prevent fraud.Sweeney said he was aware that these new immigration laws and regulations were going to affect both parties. He made it clear that the fingerprinting and scanning will be done at all US embassies worldwide. He noted that the rationale behind these latest security measures was that the US wanted something on the person “that cannot be changed” and described this as a biometric indicator. Noting that everything changed in the US since the terrorist attacks on September 11, Sweeney assured that the measures were not designed to deter visitors. He explained, that immigration officers were going to be more vigilant in issuing visas. For Trinidad and Tobago, Sweeney said 36,000 visas were issued for the year so far and he expected this to pick up with the Christmas season approaching. He was asked by one Amcham member whether TT was considered a “hot spot” by the US Homeland Security office. Sweeney said he was not aware that the US had given TT such a designation.