Regulation 2008/380 - Amendment of Regulation (EC) No 1030/2002 laying down a uniform format for residence permits for third-country nationals - Main contents

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

L 115/1

The Amsterdam Treaty aims to establish progressively an area of freedom, security and justice and confers the right of initiative on the Commission in order to take the relevant measures on a harmonised immigration policy.

It is essential that the uniform format for residence permits should contain all the necessary information and meet very high technical standards, in particular as regards safeguards against counterfeiting and falsification. This will contribute to the objective of preventing and fighting against illegal immigration and illegal residence. It must also be suited to use by all the Member States.

The integration of biometric identifiers is an important step towards the use of new elements, which establish a more reliable link between the holder and the residence permit as an important contribution to ensuring that it is protected against fraudulent use. The specifications set out in the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) document No 9303 Part 3 on Size 1 and 2 machine readable official documents should be taken into account.

Furthermore, the vast majority of Member States apply the principle of one person one document, which enhances security even further. It should be examined whether this principle should be rendered mandatory.

At its meeting in Thessaloniki on 19 and 20 June 2003, the European Council stressed that a coherent approach was needed in the EU on biometric identifiers or biometric data, which would result in harmonised solutions for documents for third country nationals, EU citizens’ passports and information systems.

The use of new technologies such as e-government and digital signature for access to e-services should be facilitated by giving Member States the possibility to use the storage medium used for the incorporation of biometric identifiers or an additional storage medium for that purpose in residence permits.

The purpose of this Regulation is solely to set the security features and biometric identifiers to be used by the Member States in a uniform format of residence permit for third-country nationals.

This Regulation only lays down specifications that are not secret; these specifications need to be supplemented by further specifications which may remain secret in order to prevent counterfeiting and falsifications and which may not include personal data or references to such data. Powers to adopt such supplementary specifications should be conferred on the Commission, which should be assisted by the Committee established by Article 6 of Council Regulation (EC) No 1683/95 of 29 May 1995 laying down a uniform format for visas (2).

With regard to the personal data to be processed in the context of the uniform format for residence permits, Directive 95/46/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 24 October 1995 on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data (3) applies. It must be ensured that no further information is stored on the uniform format for residence permits unless provided for in Council Regulation (EC) No 1030/2002 (4), its Annex or unless it is mentioned in the relevant travel...