Türkiye Warns of Imposing Visa Requirement for Schengen Citizens – SchengenVisaInfo.com

Türkiye is reportedly planning to take reciprocal measures against the citizens of the Schengen-associated countries if Turkish nationals continue to be refused Schengen visas.

Local media have said that the Turkish authorities have threatened to impose visa requirement for citizens of Schengen countries if the current situation does not improve, SchengenVisaInfo.com reports.

Turkish nationals have been facing problems for months now when planning to travel to the European Union due to the high rejection rate.

Several nationals of Türkiye have voiced their concerns on Twitter regarding the matter. A user of Twitter named Tugba Bozcaga wrote on her account that she was unable to attend one of the two conferences she was planning to attend as the consulate where she applied only issued her a 12-day single entry visa, even though she requested a multi-entry visa valid for several months to be able to attend the other conference too.

“Requested a multi-entry visa for the coming months as I’ll attend two conferences: Finland, 15-17 May; Sweden, 22-26 May; and a 3rd one in June I was hoping to attend. They gave me a 12-day SINGLE ENTRY visa,” Tugba wrote on her Twitter account.

Other people shared similar experiences, too, and some others called such treatment unacceptable.

The Head of the European Union to Türkiye, Nikolaus Meyer-Landrut, just recently commented on the increase in visa cancellation for nationals of Türkiye by the Schengen Area embassies and consulates in the country.

In an interview for Deutsche Welle Turkish service, Meyer-Landrut said that the increase in visa rejections and the delay in processing the visas is just “slightly above the world average”. In addition, he claimed that the rejections and delays are not political or exclusive to Turkish citizens.

Meyer-Landrut said that in order to avoid having their application rejected, nationals of Türkiye should make sure to submit their applications on time and, at the same time, pointed out that most of the applications were rejected since they were not complete and potentially fraudulent.

Schengen Visa Statistics show that a total of 271,977 applications were filed at the Schengen embassies by Turkish nationals, and 16.5 per cent of them were rejected. This is a significant increase compared to 2019, when the rejection rate was only 9.6 per cent.

Additionally, data show that France and Germany have the highest rejection rate for Turkish nationals.

Commenting on the figures, the editor-in-chief at SchengenVisaInfo.com, Shkurta Januzi, told Reuters earlier this week that the rejection rates for Schengen visa applications have increased worldwide. However, she pointed out that when compared to other countries, like Russia, the rejection rate growth of Türkiye is way bigger and more consistent.