European Commissioners called to investigate visa-issuing irregularities

● Ana Gomes calls on Commission to ‘punish exemplarily those found involved in engineering any kind of criminal activity’

Socialist MEP Ana Gomes, who has long been a thorn in the Maltese government’s side, has asked European Commissioner for the Rule of Law Frans Timmermans and Commissioner for Migration, Citizenship and Home Affairs Dimitris Avramopoulos to investigate a number of visa irregularities

The alleged visa rackets they are being asked to investigate deal with medical visa allegations against government employee Neville Gafà, some 88,000 Schengen visas for Libyan nationals handed out by the Maltese embassy in Tripoli and a newer case in which a Tunisian family claims to have fallen victim to still another bias racket.

Gomes – a member of the PANA Committee and of recent the MEP delegation looking into the state of the rule of law in Malta – is requesting both Commissioners to carry out fresh investigations into the issues being raised.

According to correspondence sent last month and seen by this newspaper, the MEP is also asking them to work with the Maltese authorities to establish the truth about the allegations, “to ensure that the procedures to grant visas to third country nationals are duly followed and to

punish exemplarily those found involved in engineering any kind of criminal activity and breaches of the Schengen system”.

Gomes goes on to highlight the case, exposed in 2016, of claims that 88,000 Schengen visas had been issued from the Maltese embassy in Libya.

She explains how, “The case was brought to the knowledge of the Maltese government at the time, and the matter was referred to the Attorney General and the Maltese Police. After carrying out a preliminary investigation, the police did not find enough evidence to prosecute – which is not surprising considering the findings of the European Parliament ad hoc Mission to Malta, and [the] lack of appetite of the Maltese police to press charges against people linked to the government (as the report of the European Parliament ad hoc Mission to Malta notes).

The cases, Gomes says, “Brings to light possible severe breaches of rules concerning the entry of third country nationals into the Schengen area, which might harm the integrity of the Schengen system and affect the security of the European Union.”

Gomes also underscores the involvement of Ivan Grech Mintoff, of the Alleanza Bidla party, in bringing Gafà, the Libyan whistleblower, and the questionable issuance of Libyan visas cases to the forefront.

Contacted by this newspaper yesterday, Grech Mintoff said, “When we exposed the Libyan visa scandal a year-and-a-half ago, I urged both the government and the Opposition to sit down together with us so that we could all conduct a proper cross party investigation.

“Perhaps we could resolve any harmful abuse and the real dangers of any illegal sale of visas that put at risk Malta’s security and stability and to ensure Malta’s reputation. They refused our offer. Instead, they went on a systematic media campaign to negate the facts and to protect the guilty. We are now seeing the result of their refusal to deal with the problem properly.

“Now, we are seeing the result of the OPM deciding to protect its own instead of protecting Malta and our international reputation first and foremost. Even at this late stage, I urge the Prime Minister to do the honourable thing and ask for the immediate resignations of those who let us down then and who continue to let us down today.

“Do so now, Prime Minister, before even more harm is done to our already fragile international reputation and stability.”

One case not mentioned by Gomes is that of the Algerian visas, perhaps because matters are already in hand in that respect.

Last July the European Council urged Malta to ensure that when its Consulate grants visas to Algerians, those receiving visas, which are, in effect, also visas to the whole Schengen Zone, have the actual will to return home, and they will not disappear into the wider European Union.

Following an assessment on the operations of Malta’s Consulate and visa section in Algiers, the Council recommended that Malta: “ensure[s] that applications are assessed on a caseby-case basis, with particular attention paid to the applicant’s will to return as evidenced by their individual socio-economic situation in the country of residence”.

The recommendation is not a standard one; similar sections in the Council’s report on the visa sections in Tunis and elsewhere make no such calls.

The Council also urged Malta to carry out more in-depth investigations of first-time applicants” at the Algiers Consulate, recommending that Malta “fully applies the provisions on issuing multiple-entry visas. These include visas with long validity as provided for in Article 24(2) of the Visa Code, to bona fide applicants who have proved their reliability and integrity, while continuing to carry out more in-depth investigations of firsttime applicants”.

The recommendations came as part of a wider document prepared by the European Council entitled ‘ Council Implementing Decision setting out a recommendation on addressing the deficiencies identified in the 2016 evaluation of Malta on the application of the Schengen acquis in the field of the common visa policy’.

The document makes several other recommendations on enhancing IT procedures but makes several specific recommendations on Malta’s visa operations in Algiers and Tunis.

On Thursday, the government announced changes to Identity Malta, the Malta Residence & Visa Agency (MRVA) and the Individual Investor Programme (IIP) that broke them down into three separate agencies, each entity with separate chairmen and boards of directors and each led by a chief executive officer. Three directors will be common for all three agencies.

The government said little about the reason for the shakeup.