<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" size="2">Originally posted by ILuvParis:
OK, I'll bite. What is "Schengenland?"</font>
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Europe's "Schengen" zone of easy cross-border travel is moving northwards following an agreement to give five Nordic countries observer status. Sweden, Finland and Denmark are expected to negotiate full membership of the Schengen Agreement by the end of the year, while Iceland and Norway - neither members of the EU - will enjoy an associate status. This will enable these coutries to maintain the Nordic Passport Union which allows their citizens to move freely across their borders. Full implementation of the Schengen Treaty began in July 1995 with the removal of internal border controls between six of seven Schengen Member States, opening an era of genuine free travel for millions of persons. The benefits to air travellers have been swiftly apparent now that they can move within "Schengenland" without customs or passports checks.
France, invoking internal security reasons, has decided to use the safeguard clause of the Treaty, allowing the temporary continuation of passport controls on its borders with Belgium and Luxembourg. The French government announced in April that it would be lifting controls at its borders with Germany and Spain. Nevertheless, its neighbours' police forces do have a right of pursuit on to French territory, as designed by the Treaty.
"Schengenland" is not a new member of the EU, but an area of free circulation within the Union created by seven signatories to the Schengen Agreement - Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, France, Germany, Portugal and Spain.
The Schengen Agreement was signed in 1985 in the village of Schengen, on the borders of Luxembourg, France and Germany.
Its purpose is to remove all controls at internal land, sea and airport frontiers. In order to maintain internal security, a variety of measures have been taken as e.g. coordination of visa controls at the external borders of the Member States through a common approach to visa policies and asylum procedures.
Italy (1990) and Greece (1992) have also signed, but have still to complete the physical preparations needed for the strengthening of security controls at external borders. Austria has signed on April 28, 1995.
Passengers flying between the seven countries are now leaving from domestic rather than international airport terminals, and without identity checks.
External border controls have been stepped up in the Schengen countries who are hooked up to the Schengen Information System, a computerised service giving police and immigration officials a multinational data base, of undesirables and people suspected of having committed crime, stolen vehicles and forged money. The computer stores 10 million files.
The system is especially important for policing the movements of third country nationals entering the Union at the external borders of the Schengen countries. Fears about the effectiveness of controls at the external borders have created misgivings in some Schengen countries, while a refusal to abandon its own passport controls on internal movements has prompted the UK to stay out of Schengen.
The signatories have agreed on harmonised visa arrangements covering approximately 160 countries, but still have to bring another 30 into the arrangement.
Since Schengen is an intergovernmental agreement concluded outside the EU framework, the Commission is now considering how to achieve similar freedoms on all internal movements within the Union. Mario Monti, the Commissioner responsible for the Internal Market, has indicated that he is planning new initiatives in the coming months.
However, these will have to be adopted by a unanimous decision of the Council of Ministers, which still seems far from assured. In the meantime, the European Parliament has launched a case against the Commission in the European Court of Justice for its alleged failure to force Member States to honour their Treaty obligations regarding the free movement of people."
http://europa.eu.int/en/agenda/schengen.html