Green Card Lottery may get cancelled in U.S.

July 23, 2011 - 13:45 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net - U.S. authorities may cancel the Green Card Lottery held since 1995. The United States Government issues 50,000 permanent Green Cards every year through the Diversity Immigrant Visa Program, the Green Card Lottery. Applicants are selected randomly by a computer generated drawing. Lottery winner and his family become authorized to live and work permanently in the United States.However, soon it may become impossible to receive a fast and legal residence card in the U.S. A bill on Green Card Lottery cancellation has been put to Congress vote. Republicans, the authors of the initiative believe the lottery to be a fraud. Among reasons cited in favor of cancellation are the lottery's enabling the terrorist' entrance to U.S. territory.

"Attempts at cancelling the lottery have been taken tiwce a year ever since it was launched. Many bills in the U.S. get killed at Commitee stage, so I believe the lottery will operate for many years to come," the head of Green Card Minsk Center Vladimir Suryaev said.

The deputy editor-in-chief of Expert magazine Pavil Bykov, however, has a different view. "The possibility of lottery cancellation is high enough, in view of altered situation in the U.S. A mass immigrant inflow is no longer actual, what with a great number of illegal immigrants already residing in the country. As for qualified experts, they usually receive work invitations."

The US Department of State has announced all selection results for Diversity Visa Lottery 2012 published worldwide in early May void. “We regret to inform you that, due to a computer programming problem, the results of the 2012 Diversity Lottery that were previously posted on this website have been voided,” the Department said in an announcement. “They were not valid and were posted in error,” it said. “The results were not valid because they did not represent a fair, random selection of entrants, as required by U.S. law.”

Nearly 15 million people had entered the 2012 lottery hoping to win one of 50,000 US immigrant visas available under a wild-card programme.