Ukraine has had a hard time with implementing a biometric passport.
First, there are real and compelling reasons for adopting a new document standard for passports that uses a chip to hold information (including biometric information). Defense against document fraud, human trafficking and other types of organized crime spring immediately to mind.
Then there is the pressure from Europe to modernize ID documents. Because of Europe's huge market, cultural importance and proximity to many non-EU countries, there is a lot of international travel to and from the EU. At the same time, the relative wealth of the EU countries compared to the countries with which they share land borders creates incentives for extra-legal behavior (immigration, smuggling, organized crime, etc.) that might be lowered by adopting more rigorous ID management practices.
The EU is driving its end of the bargain by harmonizing travel and ID practices within the EU (plus a few other countries; see Schengen Area) and offering visa-free travel to citizens of countries that make it easier to administer cross-border traffic through better document technology and law enforcement cooperation.
So what's not to like?
ID documents are, of course, extremely political. They are also a source of revenue to the authorities that issue them and the companies that supply the materials, services, or the manufacturing related to them.
For the nation of Ukraine and Ukrainians who are frequent international travelers successful passport modernization would be a good deal with the state collecting fees that frequent travelers can afford to pay and who are, in turn, compensated with smoother border crossings. Ukrainians who don't, won't or can't travel would be left alone.
So what's not to like?
Ordinary Ukrainians weren't sure about the second part and the international travelers weren't sure about the first part.
A year ago, the deliberations on ID document modernization in Ukraine took place under a cloud of suspicion that the new document wouldn't actually move the country to visa free travel to Europe, would cost a lot, and since Ukrainians already carry domestic passports, foreign passports, social identity cards, identity cards for insured people, pension certificates, certificates of persons with disabilities, and driving licenses, many (enough, apparently) suspected that the true impetus behind the effort was just another opportunity to collect fees and/or throw a new contract to a connected firm and they worried that the effort might not be limited to international travel documents.
Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych vetoed the effort of last year and the initiative seems to have been resurrected as something resembling the more optimal approach described in theory above.
It's not a done deal yet but it looks like Ukraine is making progress.
NOTE: This post has been modified slightly from the original version to add clarity.
UPDATE:
Valeriy Khoroshkovskiy is the first deputy prime minister of Ukraine. Perhaps more relevant to our discussion here, he also used to run the State Customs Service.
His piece today in the Kyiv Post is much lengthier than other treatments of Ukraine's regional integration efforts which tend to be very narrowly focused.
In it, he discusses in more detail many of the topics we touched on above, including:
- Visa free regime with the EU;
- Biometric passports;
- Other identity documents;
- Human trafficking;
- and the flip-side of organized crime, corruption.
