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That's good news from the From the Spanish Embassy...ashimashi wrote:here's the spanish one:
http://www.maec.es/subwebs/Embajadas/Du ... ngHSW.aspx
According to Directive 2004 / 38 EC possesion of a valid EU Fam residence card shall EXEMPT family members of EU citizens from the visa requirements, providing they accompany or join them. In any circumstances, EU citizens family members’ applications will be processed with due priority.
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Christian
Date: Thu, Aug 28, 2008 at 3:59 PM
Subject: Visa necessary? No! - Petition to parliament
To: All EU-embassies in Dublin
CC: All people who replied, Norway, Iceland and Switzerland
Dear Madam or Sir,
recently your country's embassy in Dublin (Ireland) was asked weather my wife would need a visa to visit your country.
The same question was sent to all EU-embassies in Dublin in order to see what the replies would be. All answers I received are listed here:
http://www.immigrationboards.com/viewtopic.php?t=30020
This reveals that even within Schengen-countries the answer to the same question is not always the same:
My wife is Lebanese, I am German, my wife is in possession of an Irish-issued "4EUFam"-card and we want to travel together.
The mentioned 4EUFam-card is the Irish version of a 'Residence card of a family member of a Union citizen'.
In this setup, the applicable law is Directive 2004/38/EC (available >>here<<). Article 5 in conjunction with Article 10 stipulate, that family-members of EU-citizens can travel together throughout all of the European Union without any additional visa.
Article 5
Right of entry
1. (...)
2. ... For the purposes of this Directive, possession of
the valid residence card referred to in Article 10 shall exempt
such family members from the visa requirement.The European Commission describes the consequences of the law >>here<<:Article 10
Issue of residence cards
1. The right of residence of family members of a Union
citizen who are not nationals of a Member State shall be
evidenced by the issuing of a document called 'Residence card
of a family member of a Union citizen' (...)
The answer to my original question ("does my wife need a visa when traveling together with me") is thus "no - she does not need a visa".
I explicitly apologise for "testing" this, my sole aim is to be able to travel throughout the European Union with my wife, as this is our right per the Directive. I wish to raise awareness for this niche-situation, as due to a lack of general knowledge of this regulation it is not easy to travel according to this rule.
I acknowledge that the situation the legislator created for embassies is complicated, however I feel it is very important to be aware of the details.
In the same regard I sent a petition to the European Parliament (can be seen >>here<<), suggesting that the "Residence Cards for Family Members" should have a uniform look and some other features, that would eliminate the problems that became very obvious through the very diverse replies.
To make this complete I need to make specific mention of some countriesI am hoping to achieve the following:
- May I direct your special attention to the very good answers of Slovenia and Denmark. They answer correctly that a visa is NOT needed, while also fully describing the mess we are in. Unfortunately only the Danish version is available as an email, as the Slovenian embassy called me and gave very useful information over the phone.
- I never sent the original question to Austria, Belgium, Cyprus and Malta as they confirmed that this is correct in earlier contacts I had with those embassies. Thus this email is informational for them.
- As Iceland and Norway are inside Schengen they are indirectly involved, so I asked them too in order to get a complete picture. As they are outside the EU I guess 2004/38/EC does not automatically apply - therefore this is purely an informational email for them as well.
- As Switzerland's webpages describe the situation for Switzerland and Liechtenstein without any ambiguity, I never asked them in the first place. In the light of their accession to the Schengen-community in the near future, I include them as recipients in this email too.
Thank you very much for your attention,
- To initiate some fruitful discussion between the involved embassies and ministries.
- To receive acknowledgment from all remaining embassies that the above is indeed correct.
- That all EU-embassies in Dublin include information about this specific situation on their respective websites.
- You may want to inform your respective embassies in London, Sofia, Bukarest and Nicosia of this, as this situation applies in those counties as well.
regards from Dublin,
Christian
Anyone think so, especially the moderators?porkpie wrote:I would suggest it might not be a smart move to get them looking around on here though!
Explicitly acknowledging that I originally wrote the above, I now deleted this passage from the email I will send to all embassies.No Name wrote:The reason I posted my message was that ca.funke wrote:However the answer ca.funke got from the Icelandic embassy was incorrect and therefore not impressive:The Icelandic answer is, in my opinion, the most impressive one overall, as it correctly describes the situation inside the EU, as well as how this affects Iceland.
(please PM me, I'll give credit)The above mentioned countries deny us this right, urging us to apply for visas before traveling.---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Christian
Date: Thu, Sep 11, 2008 at 10:48 AM
Subject: Complaint against various countries in connection with 2004/38/EC
To: EU Plaintes < sg-plaintes@ec.europa.eu >
Cc: embassies of countries as mentioned below
Dear Madam or Sir,
I hereby lodge a complaint against the following countries:[list][*]the Czech Republic
[*]Estonia
[*]France
[*]Greece
[*]Hungary
[*]Italy
[*]Lithuania
[*]Portugal
[*]Slovakia
[*]the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland[/list]
Grounds for the complaint:
I am German, my wife is Lebanese, we live in Ireland and we are in possession of a "Residence card of a family member of a Union citizen" (in Ireland called "4EUFam").
As per Directive 2004/38/EC, Articles 5 and 10, we have the right to travel throughout all of the European Union without additional visas for my Lebanese wife. This right is additionally confirmed on >>your very own website<<.
(http://ec.europa.eu/youreurope/nav/en/c ... ex_en.html)
[quote]YOU MIGHT BE REQUIRED TO HAVE AN ENTRY VISA
(...)
Possession of the valid residence card, referred to in the relevant fact sheet, issued by any Member State, exempts you from the visa obligation not only in the Member State which issued the residence card, but in all Member States.
It took me a visit to GNIB office and a few fone calls to DOJ followed by a letter from our sollicitor to have it changed (about 2weeks which is fair enough). 
y: Followed the link but only find this info:ca.funke wrote:Spain - no answer so far
Through posts of ashimashi and archigabe this seems to be OK as follows:
archigabe wrote:That's good news from the From the Spanish Embassy...
http://www.maec.es/subwebs/Embajadas/Du ... ublin.aspx
According to Directive 2004 / 38 EC possesion of a valid EU Fam residence card shall EXEMPT family members of EU citizens from the visa requirements, providing they accompany or join them. In any circumstances, EU citizens family members’ applications will be processed with due priority.
as follows:The Germans, the Dutch and some East European countries are just about the few literate and law abiding EEA countries, the rest including the UK, France and Spain are just a bunch of idiots. They sign upto directives, then decide not to implement it or they try banana republic tactics to deprive people of their legal rights.archigabe wrote:We just got back from a trip to Frankfurt,Germany.Had no problems entering or leaving with Stamp4 EU fam card.
Eerrgghh - when I posted what I posted I copied and pasted from their website...trinity wrote:...Followed the link but only find this info...
