Pompeo, Nigerian talk of visa curbs

WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Tuesday that he’s optimistic Nigeria will take the steps needed to remove itself from U.S. visa restrictions that were imposed last week.

Pompeo did not offer a timeline for the removal of the restrictions that the country’s foreign minister said had “blindsided” Nigerian officials.

The restrictions announced on Friday bar Nigerians from receiving immigrant visas to live permanently in the United States. The Trump administration said the curbs were necessary because Nigeria was not adequately sharing information about its citizens. Nigeria is among six countries affected by the new restrictions. The others are Kyrgyzstan, Burma, Eritrea, Sudan and Tanzania. Burma is often called Myanmar, a name that military authorities adopted in 1989. Some nations, such as the United States and Britain, have refused to adopt the name change.

Nigeria “has room to grow in sharing important national security information,” Pompeo said, standing beside Foreign Minister Geoffrey Onyeama at the State Department. “I am optimistic that is going to happen.”

Onyeama said Nigeria had identified the issues behind the ban and was already taking steps to address them. He said Nigeria was close to creating an information sharing mechanism that would meet passport security criteria.

The U.S. travel restrictions come as Nigeria’s military is battling a decade-long insurgency by the Islamic extremist group Boko Haram and also is confronting a breakaway faction that has pledged allegiance to the Islamic State militant group.