Visa policy: Council and European Parliament secure a deal on rules about the suspension of visa-free travel for third countries

June 26, 2025

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SOURCE: EUROPEAN COUNCIL- The Council and the European Parliament (EP) settled on an update of the mechanism that allows the EU to suspend visa-free travel for citizens of third countries who are exempt from applying for a visa when travelling to the Schengen area. With this amended law the EU will be better placed to react to situations where visa-free travel is being abused or works against the interests of the EU.

‘Visa-free travel to the EU benefits foreign citizens and the EU alike. But if citizens of third countries abuse this advantage, the EU must have all necessary tools in place to correct the situation. These instruments can put pressure on countries that evade cooperation in preventing and combating irregular migration.

Radosław Sikorski, Polish Minister for Foreign Affairs

New grounds to suspend visa-free travel

The Council and the EP agreed on a number of new grounds which will trigger the suspension mechanism:

lack of alignment of a country’s visa-free regime with the EU’s visa policy, in cases where – owing to this country’s geographical proximity to the EU – this may lead to increased non-authorised arrivals of citizens of other third countries
the operation of an investor citizenship scheme, whereby citizenship is granted to people who have no genuine link to the third country concerned, in exchange for pre-determined payments or investments
hybrid threats and deficiencies in document security legislation and procedures
a deterioration in the EU’s external relations with a third country, in particular when it comes to human rights and fundamental freedoms or serious breaches of the UN Charter.

These reasons for suspension are added to existing grounds such as an increase in the number of asylum applications from nationals of a country for which the asylum recognition rate is low or an increase in the number of third-country nationals who are refused entry or found to be overstaying.

Thresholds to trigger the suspension mechanism

The new legislation will contain thresholds for some of these suspension grounds. This will lead to more clarity about when the suspension of visa freedom should kick in and make the mechanism more effective.

A threshold of 30% quantifies substantial increases of cases of refused entry and overstay, asylum applications and serious criminal offences.

The threshold to assess whether an asylum recognition rate should be considered low has been fixed at 20%.

Duration of the visa suspension

The Council and the EP want the duration of temporary suspension of the visa exemption to increase from the current period of 9 months to 12 months. This initial period can be extended by a further 24 months (instead of 18 months under the current system). This temporary suspension phase will allow the European Commission to engage in a dialogue with the third country so that the country in question can remedy the circumstances that led to the suspension.

The EU can decide to permanently revoke the visa-free travel regime if the third country does not address the reasons that led to the temporary suspension.

Targeted application of the suspension mechanism

The Council and the EP also agreed to improve the mechanism by making it possible to only limit the visa freedom of decision-makers responsible for breaching fundamental rights and external relations obligations. Currently, all citizens are affected in the second phase of the suspension, but this can be disproportionate where a government is clearly responsible for the situation.

Under the new rules, the additional 24-month suspension phase would not automatically affect the entire population. Instead, in the above situations, the EU could decide to continue targeting government officials and diplomats.

Next steps

The provisional agreement will now need to be confirmed by both institutions before it can be formally adopted.

Background

The visa suspension mechanism, in place since 2013, is a safeguard against the abuse of visa-free travel. It allows the EU to temporarily suspend the visa exemption under certain conditions.

Abuse of visa freedom can be a cause of irregular migration. This is the case, for example, when third-country travellers overstay after their visa expires. In recent years, the EU has also witnessed high numbers of unfounded asylum applications from people who arrived visa-free in the Schengen zone. An increase in asylum applications can also occur when people use countries that are close to the EU, and whose visa policy is not aligned with that of the EU, as a stepping stone for irregular travel into the EU.