Flood of visa applications for Malta CHOGM

An official from the Foreign Affairs Ministry is being sent to London to deal specifically with the deluge of visa applications expected ahead of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Conference, Foreign Minister Michael Frendo said yesterday.

Dr Frendo, who was in London for a meeting related to the Commonwealth, was responding to a comment made on Wednesday by the deputy director of the Commonwealth Foundation, Ruto Chitiga, who said that certain participants in events surrounding CHOGM - being held in Malta in the last week of November - were at risk of being treated like "refugees" unless the government ensured they are granted visas.

Dr Frendo said the earlier people applied, the better because security considerations may mean it would not be possible to process applications in time for CHOGM and the associated events.

"We have discussed how we are going to facilitate visas in preparation for the events that precede CHOGM. We need to work with the Home Affairs Ministry and we are already tackling that. I don't know why this comment came about," he said.

Dr Frendo also responded to another comment by Ms Chitiga, who questioned Malta's commitment to development aid, by saying the island already had commitments by virtue of its EU membership.

"A commitment made in the EU's General Affairs and External Relations Council meant that the 15 pre-enlargement members of the Union committed themselves to giving 0.51 per cent of their GNI to development aid by 2010 and 0.7 per cent by 2015.

"The new 10 - who are moving from recipient to donor and we want to remain recipients within the EU if we can agree on the financial perspectives - will 'strive to reach' 0.17 per cent by 2010 and 0.33 per cent by 2015."

He said Malta was expected to move from being a recipient country to a donor country, which was not always an easy thing to do because the people needed to understand the change.

Dr Frendo said a development unit within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was also being set up, though he stressed that the Maltese had always been very generous in terms of humanitarian aid.

"If you take the tsunami aid, we actually exceeded 0.17 in 2004 - which means about Lm3 million..."

Dr Frendo said the rules should be changed so that development aid took into account what the people of a country donated as well as government aid.

This coverage was made possible by the Strickland Foundation and Air Malta.