EU to negotiate visa-free travel to US

0 Comments | AFP, April, 2008

LUXEMBOURG (AFP) — EU nations agreed Friday to open negotiations as a bloc with Washington on visa-free US travel, after some eastern members sought their own bilateral deals.

EU interior ministers, meeting in Luxembourg, gave a mandate to the European Commission to negotiate the conditions for a deal allowing all member countries to participate in the US visa waiver programme.

Most older EU states are already part of the visa waiver scheme, but Greece and most of the 12 mainly ex-communist nations who have joined the bloc since 2004 are not.

Frustrated at the lack of progress in talks led by the commission, some of those countries left out of the programme have negotiated bilateral deals, much to Brussels' concern.

"We agreed that our common goal is...