EU law going back to the foundation of the EEC, basically says
for EU family members, the supporting documentation required at application of a visa is limited to the supporting documentation required at application
for an EU family residence card.
See Directives 68/360/EEC, 73/148/EEC, 90/365/EEC and 64/221/EEC
For case law, you look for case law concerning
Right of residence - Residence permit - Third-country national who is a member of the family of a Community national
e.g.
C-157/03 - Commission v Spain (note: pre 2004/38/EC)
1. The requirement for an immigration visa
26. That national of a non-Member State should not be required to show any
independent reason for entering into the territory. His right, as a matter of
Community law, is derived from the right enjoyed by the Community national, so
that to require that person to fulfill formal conditions prior to entry into
national territory constitutes not only a restriction on his (derived) right but
also a restriction on the principal right of the Community national.
31. It is therefore apparent from the provisions of the directives on the
entry of members of the family, as interpreted by the Court, that entry
formalities must be restricted to the expressly specified documents and that any
further immigration procedure is not permissible.
"a document issued by the competent authority of the State of origin
or the State whence they came, proving their relationship"
Nowadays, the supporting document requirements are always based
on this principle, cannot exceed the documents needed to obtain residence card
So the demands from the German Embassy mentioned in the earlier post,
e.g. finger prints and work history of third country family member are a clear law
breaking violation, no dispute.
For Schengen Embassy rules for EU family members, see
Schengen "
Handbook for the processing of visa applications and the modification of issued visas"
http://ec.europa.eu/home-affairs/polici ... 1620_en.pd
3.6. Supporting documents
In order to prove that the applicant has the right to be issued with an entry visa under the
Directive, he must establish that he is a beneficiary of the Directive. This is done by
presenting documents relevant for the purposes of the three questions referred to above, i.e.
proving that:
• there is an EU citizen from whom the visa applicant can derive any rights;
• the visa applicant is a family member (e.g. a marriage certificate, birth certificate,
proof of dependency, serious health grounds, durability of partnerships …) and his
identity (passport); and
• the visa applicant accompanies or joins an EU citizen (e.g. a proof that the EU
citizen already resides in the host Member State or a confirmation that the EU
citizen will travel to the host Member State).
It is an established principle of EU law in the area of free movement that visa applicants have
the right of choice of the documentary evidence by which they wish to prove that they are
covered by the Directive (i.e. of the family link, dependency …). Member States may,
however, ask for specific documents (e.g. a marriage certificate as the means of proving the
existence of marriage), but should not refuse other means of proof.
For further information in relation to the documentation, see Commission Communication
COM (2009) 313 final34.
This is why there is * sign to exempt EU family members from certain questions, because its actually against EU law to ask them.
any further immigration procedure is not permissible as interpreted by the ECJ Court.
But the rule of law does not stop the German Embassy trying.
