French and German ambassadors on Monday downplayed allegations of discriminatory attitudes and unreasonable delays in visa issuance to Saudis for several European and Schengen countries. Bertrand Besancenot, French Ambassador, and Volkmar Wenzel, German Ambassador, jointly addressed a press conference at the German Embassy to announce the outsourcing of visa services. Besancenot said reports in a section of the press blaming unreasonable delays in the issuance of visas to Saudi nationals were unfounded and unjustifiable. “In fact, the wording used in the reports was outrageous and insulting to the officials working in our visa section,” he said. The envoy said there has been a need for the improvement of visa services on both sides, and it was true that the French Embassy had discussions with the Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs on the issue. He did not elaborate, but said that French nationals visiting other GCC states receive visas at the airport. “We wish to have good visa services in both directions,” said Wenzel. “Of course in some cases things might have gone wrong, and we have already tried to take remedial measures,” Wenzel said, referring to some irregularities in visa services. Citing the huge demand for European and Schengen visas and the need to improve visa processing services, the French and German embassies have awarded an outsourcing contract to VFS Global, which will open a Visa Application Center for processing of French and German visas. Wenzel said starting May 23, VFS will receive applications for German visas while outsourcing for French visas will commence from June 17. The official inauguration of the VFS Visa Application Center, located at SI Center, opposite Riyadh TV Tower, 5th Floor, King Fahad Road will be on June 16. The working hours of the center will be between 9 A.M. and 5 P.M. Saturday through Wednesday. Every applicant will receive a scheduled appointment from VFS to submit an application to the respective embassies. Processing time at the Embassy will be reduced to a mere 10-minutes. After 10-day consultation procedures, the applicant will be able to collect the passport at VFS. However, an additional SR85 will be charged for visa processing. In 2008, the German Embassy received 15,000 visa applications, including 11,000 from Saudi nationals, with 4,533 being tourist visas for Saudis. There has been an increase of around 15 percent in visa applications received at the French and German embassies every year, the envoys said. The French Embassy in Riyadh and its Consulate Office in Jeddah received around 53,733 visa applications in 2008, which was an increase of 15 percent compared to the previous year. However, with the outsourcing and opening of the Visa Application Center, the waiting and processing time at visa counters will be considerably shortened.
