Visa policy of the Schengen Area

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The German embassy in Ankara on June 6 announced that around 100,000 Schengen visas were issued in Türkiye in 2023, countering the recent difficulties faced by Turkish citizens when applying for visas.

Germany currently does not issue more visas to any country in the world than Türkiye, the statement released on the embassy's Twitter account emphasized.

With the rising Schengen visa problems experienced by Turkish citizens, a Turkish man from Istanbul will be unable to attend his own wedding in Germany due to the rejection of his application, local media has reported.

Complaints about the Schengen visa, which is required for Turkish citizens to enter European Union member countries, have increased recently.

Today, the European Commission presented a new report on the state of the Schengen area, in which it once again expresses its support for the accession of Bulgaria and Romania to Schengen by the end of the year, BTA reported.

More than 700,000 Turkish citizens applied for Schengen visa in 2022, placing the country in the first place among the countries with the highest number of visa applications.

Türkiye surpassed Russia in the number of applications and pushed it back to second place for the first time in history, according to the Schengen Visa Statistics data released last week.

Within the framework of the visit to Austria, Deputy Prime Minister for Public Order and Security and Minister of Internal Affairs Ivan Demerdzhiev held a meeting with his colleague Gerhard Karner, Federal Minister of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Austria. The emphasis in the talks was placed on the recent positive resolution of the issue of Bulgaria's Schengen membership.

Kosovo citizens will be able travel freely to the EU's passport-free Schengen zone by the start of 2024 after European Parliament members approved the removal of the visa regime on Tuesday.

Kosovo passport holders will be able to travel to the EU without visas for 90 days in any 180-day period.

Visa liberalization between the EU and Kosovo allows the citizens of Kosovo to travel and stay in the EU for up to 90 days without a visa in any period of six months with passports issued by the temporary Pristina authorities, the EP website said.

The Nation Alliance's joint presidential candidate and the Republican People's Party (CHP) leader, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, said on April 5 that his government would meet all the European Union visa liberalization benchmarks in three months and Turks will not need a Schengen visa to enter the EU if the opposition bloc comes to power in the next elections.

"We support the membership of Bulgaria and Romania in Schengen, because the Balkan countries play a very important role for us," Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson, whose country currently holds the EU presidency, told the plenary hall of the European Parliament.

"Serbia risks its own visa-free regime with the EU if it does not reduce the flow of migrants from third countries who travel without visas to its territory and then on to the EU", European diplomatic sources say ahead of the meeting of interior ministers in Luxembourg.