Norway and Bosnia and Herzegovina sign Visa Facilitation Agreement
22/07/2008 //
Minister of Security, Mr. Tarik Sadovic and the Ambassador of Norway, Mr. Jan Braathu, have today, 22 July 2008, signed a Visa Facilitation Agreement between the two countries.
The agreement will come into effect as soon as the ratification process is completed – hopefully before the end of the year.
The agreement is a first concrete step toward a visa-free travel regime. It will facilitate the issuing of visas to nationals of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and thereby further enhance people-to-people contacts between the two countries. Such contacts are considered to be an important condition for a steady development of economic, humanitarian, cultural, scientific and other bilateral relations.
The content of the agreement is based on the agreement already in place between BiH and EU-member countries. Since Norway is not a member of the EU, but a member of the Schengen co-operation, it was however necessary to enter into a separate agreement with BiH.