The Hungarian Embassy in Ankara has clarified a "warning note" attached to a Turkish passport approved for a Schengen visa as rejection issues continue to plague Türkiye.
The Hungarian Embassy would be obliged to reject visa applications without a note of warning per Schengen rules, Ambassador Viktor Matis told Turkish broadcaster NTV on Thursday after criticism.
The "warning note" in the passport of a Turkish citizen approved for an eight-day valid Schengen visa told the citizen to visit the Hungarian Embassy’s consulate division within a week upon returning to Türkiye.
It was for the consulate to assess whether the visa was "used in due form," the embassy said.
"Our aim is to give applicants that we are not completely sure about the chance to use the visa in accordance with the rules," Matis said.
"Nearly 2% of the applications in Ankara were issued this note along with their visas. One in three people who received this request proved that they used their visa in due form. If this note is absent, we have to reject their applications."
In a post on X, Matis previously explained that Hungary was employing this method to determine passengers that obtain a visa to Hungary and travel to other Schengen countries from there.
According to the ambassador, the warning note is issued for one out of every 45 travelers who obtain a Schengen visa.
"We approved their visa since we didn’t want to reject them because we weren’t certain," he said.
Türkiye, in recent years, has complained that lengthy processing times and a significant increase in rejection rates of applications for visas to the 27 Schengen countries disrupted travel and business plans. Ankara denounces this as a deliberate effort and "political blackmail" amid troubled ties with the European Union.
Türkiye has been an official candidate to join the EU for 24 years, but accession talks have stalled in recent years over a number of disagreements and political roadblocks. Türkiye suggests it has fulfilled most of the criteria for membership.
Since last summer, Ankara and the bloc have been working to rekindle ties, which, for many years, have operated not toward mutual trust and strategic goals but only out of necessity.
Türkiye launched a "visa liberalization dialogue" with the EU in December 2013. Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan told lawmakers last year that Schengen visa rejection rates were around 4% between 2014 and 2016. According to data from the European Commission, after 2016, it increased every year and reached 17% in 2021. He, however, noted a drop to 15.7% in 2022. Fidan said they invited ambassadors of several EU countries with high rejection rates to the ministry and voiced Türkiye’s demands and expectations on the issue.
The dialogue on visa liberalization aims to eliminate the requirement for Turkish citizens to obtain visas for short-term touristic, business or family-related visits (90-180 days) to all EU member states except Ireland and the Schengen countries Iceland, Liechtenstein, Switzerland and Norway.