LONDON: The UK government this week announced an overhaul in non-visa entry requirements for visitors from next year.
The Electronic Travel Authorization (ETA) scheme is similar to the ESTA system in the United States.
The interior ministry announced that all visitors who do not require a visa to travel to Britain will need an ETA from April 2, 2025.
“Everyone wishing to travel to the UK — except British and Irish citizens — will need permission to travel in advance of coming here.
“This can be either through an ETA or an eVisa,” the Home Office said in a statement.
It is a travel permit digitally linked to the traveler’s passport and is for people entering or transiting the UK without a visa or legal residence rights.
It costs £10 (12 euros, 13 dollars) and permits multiple journeys to the UK for stays of up to six months at a time over two years or until the holder’s passport expires — whichever is sooner.
Eligibility is based on nationality and suitable travelers can apply using the UK ETA app.
Previously, most visitors could arrive at a British airport with their passport and enter the country without a visa.
But that began to change in November last year when the then Conservative government introduced the ETA, starting with Qatari nationals.
The scheme was extended earlier this year and currently includes citizens of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Children and babies from these countries need an ETA too.
Interior minister Yvette Cooper announced on Tuesday that all nationalities except Europeans can apply for an ETA from November 27. They will need one travel to Britain from January 8 next year.
The scheme will then extend to eligible Europeans, who will require an ETA from April 2, 2025. They will be able to apply from March 5.
Eligible travelers will need one even if they are just using the UK to connect to an onward flight abroad.
British and Irish passport holders and those with passports for a British overseas territory do not need an ETA.
Travelers with a visa also do not require one, nor do people with permission to live, work or study in the UK, including people settled under the EU Settlement Scheme agreed as part of Britain’s exit from the European Union in January 2020.
Travelers can get an ETA if they are coming to the UK for up to six months for tourism, visiting family and friends, business or short-term study.
They cannot get married, claim benefits, live in the country through frequent visits, or take up work as a self-employed person.
The Home Office says ETAs are “in line with the approach many other countries have taken to border security, including the US and Australia.”
It also mirrors the ETIAS scheme for visa-exempt nationals traveling to 30 European countries, including France and Germany, that the European Commission expects to be operational early next year.
It is part of the government’s drive to digitise its border and immigration system.
The Home Office says it will ensure “more robust security checks are carried out before people begin their journey to the UK,” which helps prevent “abuse of our immigration system.”
It is partly a consequence of Brexit, which ended freedom of movement to Britain for European nationals.
Heathrow Airport has blamed the ETA scheme for a 90,000 drop in transfer passenger numbers on routes included in the program since it was launched.
It has described the system as “devastating for our hub competitiveness” and wants the government to “review” the inclusion of air transit passengers.
UK to change travel entry requirements
https://arab.news/bt5xr
UK to change travel entry requirements
- The interior ministry announced that all visitors who do not require a visa to travel to Britain will need an ETA from April 2, 2025
- “This can be either through an ETA or an eVisa,” the Home Office said
Agonizing wait as Switzerland works to identify New Year’s fire victims
- Authorities begin moving bodies from burned-out bar in luxury ski resor Crans-Montana
- At least 40 people were killed in one of Switzerland's worst tragedies
CRANS-MONTANA, Switzerland: Families endured an agonizing wait for news of their loved ones Friday as Swiss investigators rushed to identify victims of a ski resort fire at a New Year’s celebration that killed at least 40 people.
Authorities began moving bodies from the burned-out bar in the luxury ski resort town Crans-Montana late Friday morning, with the first silver-colored hearse rolling into the funeral center in nearby Sion shortly after 11:00 am (1000 GMT), AFP journalists saw.
Around 115 people were also injured in the fire, many of them critical condition.
As the scope of the tragedy — one of Switzerland’s worst — began to sink in, Crans-Montana appeared enveloped in a stunned silence.
“The atmosphere is heavy,” Dejan Bajic, a 56-year-old tourist from Geneva who has been coming to the resort since 1974, told AFP.
“It’s like a small village; everyone knows someone who knows someone who’s been affected,” he said.
It is not yet clear what set off the blaze at Le Constellation, a bar popular with young tourists, at around 1:30 am (0030 GMT) Thursday.
Bystanders described scenes of panic and chaos as people tried to break the windows to escape and others, covered in burns, poured into the street.
‘Screaming in pain’
Edmond Cocquyt, a Belgian tourist, told AFP he had seen “bodies lying here, ... covered with a white sheet,” and “young people, totally burned, who were still alive... Screaming in pain.”
The exact death toll was still being established.
And it could rise, with canton president Mathias Reynard telling the regional newspaper Wallizer Bote that at least 80 of the 115 injured were in critical condition.
Swiss authorities warned it could take days to identify everyone who perished, an agonizing wait for family and friends.
Condolences poured in from around the world, including from Pope Leo XIV, who offered “compassion and solidarity” to victims’ families.
Online, desperate appeals abound to find the missing.
“We’ve tried to reach our friends. We took loads of photos and posted them on Instagram, Facebook, all possible social networks to try to find them,” said Eleonore, 17. “But there’s nothing. No response.”
‘The apocalypse’
The exact number of people who were at the bar when it went up in flames remains unclear.
Le Constellation had a capacity of 300 people, plus another 40 people on its terrace, according to the Crans-Montana website.
Swiss President Guy Parmelin, who took office on Thursday, called the fire “a calamity of unprecedented, terrifying proportions” and announced that flags would be flown at half-mast for five days.
“We thought it was just a small fire — but when we got there, it was war,” Mathys, from the neighboring village of Chermignon-d’en-Bas, told AFP. “That’s the only word I can use to describe it: the apocalypse.”
Authorities have declined to speculate on what caused the tragedy, saying only that it was not an attack.
Several witness accounts, broadcast by various media, pointed to sparklers mounted on champagne bottles and held aloft by restaurant staff as part of a regular “show” for patrons.
‘Dramatic’
Pictures and videos shared on social media also showed sparklers on champagne bottles held into the air, as an orange glow began spreading across the ceiling.
One video showed the flames advancing quickly as revellers initially continued to dance.
One young man playfully attempted to extinguish the flames with a large white cloth, but the scene became panic-stricken as people scrambled and screamed in the dark against a backdrop of smoke and flames.
The canton’s chief prosecutor, Beatrice Pilloud, said investigators would examine whether the bar met safety standards.
Red and white caution tape, flowers and candles adorned the street outside, while police shielded the site with white screens.
Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani, who said 13 Italians had been injured in the fire, and six remained missing, was among those to lay flowers at the site.
The French foreign ministry said nine French citizens figured among the injured, and eight others remained unaccounted for.
After emergency units at local hospitals filled, many of the injured were transported across Switzerland and beyond.
Patients are being treated in Italy, France and Germany, and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said his country was ready to provide “specialized medical care to 14 injured.”
Multiple sources told AFP the bar owners were French nationals: a couple originally from Corsica who, according to a relative, are safe, but have been unreachable since the tragedy.
