The Belgian Senate has voted to give regional-level voting rights to non-European immigrants.  The bill passed with a vote of 41 to 29.  The bill allows non-European immigrants in Belgium to register in communal elections if they have lived in Belgium for at least five consecutive years.

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In July of this year, British Home Secretary David Blunkett announced new rules for student visas.  Foreign students who returned to schools in September had to complete new applications to extend their visas and send their passports to offices throughout Britain for processing.  The students were promised that 70% of the applications would be processed within three weeks and all applications would be processed within thirteen weeks.

However, delays in processing and the misplacement of several passports by the British Home Office may leave foreign students at British boarding schools trapped in Great Britain for Christmas.

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A new immigration law in Spain will make it easier to deport illegal immigrants.  The new law, which came into effect this month, will also require anyone entering Spain from a non-European Union country, especially Morocco, to apply for a visa before they arrive.

More than 100 illegal immigrants have been killed in 2003 trying to reach Spanish shores and according to official figures, between January and November, almost 18,000 illegal immigrants were detained before reaching Spanish land.  Many of these illegal immigrants come from Morocco.

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Justice Ministry officials in Japan have announced that the government will tighten visa requirements for foreign students for the next academic year due to the number of crimes allegedly committed by students who overstayed their visas.  The new requirements will apply to universities and Japanese language schools, where it has been discovered that many students have overstayed their visas, as well as to prospective students from countries with a record of overstaying problems, particularly China.

The new measures will also assess the credibility of language proficiency certificates submitted to Japanese schools by the student’s home institutions, and may blacklist those schools that issue certificates to students who lack the proper Japanese language skills.  Officials say that these steps are aimed at ensuring that the students have sufficient funds to live in Japan, and that the primary purpose of their stay is to study.