in Washington

Visa-free tourism effort makes ground in Washington

Guam’s effort to promote visa-free tourism from Asia (PIM, January page 9) is inching ahead in Washington as part of the territory’s continuing drive to control more of its immigra tion policy.

Congress has twice passed legislation sought by the island to create a visa waiver for Guam-bound tourists and until recently the mainland Immigra tion and Naturalisation Service

(INS) has dragged its feet regar ding implementation.

INS worries about illegal aliens and undefined “security concerns”. The Governor’s office and Guam Congressman Ben Blaz think in terms of more tourists.

INS has now drafted regula tions which would, at some time in the near future, allow 15-day visits without visas from a dozen sources: Australia, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan,

Malaysia, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Singapore, Solo mon Islands, United Kingdom, Vanuatu and Western Samoa.

The problem is that the list excludes three nations of strong interest to Guam The Philip pines, South Korea and Taiwan.

INS worries too that many visa applications are denied in those countries and that to give residents the right to visit Guam without visas would simply lead to problems of immigration control.

Congress, in passing the legislation, spoke about gran ting visa waivers to nations where the visa refusal rate was at or below 16 per cent.

However, the refusal rate in Taiwan and South Korea has moved up to 25 per cent while that of the Philippines is over 40 per cent. There is some talk in Washington that INS will add South Korea to the final list as a result of pressure from Guam.

Actual implementation of the scheme will be delayed until INS and Guam can work out who will pay for the program and until a new computerised

exit-entry control system can be set in motion. Australia and Fiji both have such systems, but the US and Guam do not.

The list of 12 nations prop osed for the visa-waiver prog ram contains few goodies for Guam except Hong Kong.

The bulk of Guam’s tourist arrivals originate in Japan (Guam is the traditional place for Japanese honeymoons) but Japanese have no trouble obtaining visas.

The other nations on the proposed list are distant from Guam, are generally not on direct air routes and in many cases (e.g. Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and Western Samoa) are more noted for receiving tourists than for sending them to distant destinations.

On another front Guam’s voters will decide in April on a proposed Guam Common wealth Act an island wish list which includes territorial control of immigration.

The Act, however, will be subject to extensive Con gressional review and probably revision. David S. North in Washington.