Word: visaed
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...planned to rally athletes to raise awareness of troubles in Sudan. He wanted to outline the steps that China, which has close ties to the Sudanese government, could take to stop the atrocities in Darfur. I half-jokingly asked him how he managed to get his hands on a visa, since the Chinese government was notoriously begrudging to let potential nuisances step foot in the country during the Olympics. "Man, I really don't know," he said, laughing. "I don't know if I want to say how it might have happened, in case they want to close that loophole...
...other politically sensitive groups to the foreign media, causing the predictable outcry from international press and human right groups. (Officials have since backed down and opened up the sites). Now comes word that China has banned Cheek to enter the country on the eve of the Games, revoking the visa of an American athletic hero who donated his $40,000 in medal winnings from the 2006 Olympics to Darfurian refugees in Chad...
After his visa was revoked August 5, Cheek said the Chinese government official who called him said he was "not required to give a reason" for revoking the visa. "The Chinese government's efforts to suppress athletes...who speak about essential human rights is a violation of that core Olympic spirit," Cheek said in a statement (Cheek did not immediately respond to a phone call and email from TIME.) During our pre-trip talk, Cheek has been more optimistic. "Ultimately, the legacy of these Games haven't yet been sealed," he said. "There's still great hope, despite...
Much bigger deals are in the works, and the competition will be fierce. Among the leading contenders: Lockheed Martin, Accenture and Computer Sciences Corp. By Dec. 31, CBP is required by law to fingerprint all visitors with visas at the 50 busiest land crossings along the Canadian and Mexican borders. The remaining 100 or so land-crossing points must be covered by the end of 2005. This year the State Department's 211 consular offices must be able to fingerprint all visa applicants and embed all U.S. visas with a bar code containing the traveler's digitized print, photo...
Facial-recognition biometric technology will also come into the mix this year. From Oct. 26, visitors from the 27 so-called visa-waiver nations--most of Europe, plus Australia, Japan, Singapore and Brunei--will be required to present passports embedded with machine-readable bar codes containing a facial biometric, which a computer will compare with a digital photo taken upon entry. Some foreign governments have already made the transition. Italy has rolled out an identity card with a fingerprint and facial biometric. A number of countries, notably Saudi Arabia, are looking at biometrics for national-identity cards and border control...