EU to call again on Canada to drop visa requirements for Czechs, Romanians and Bulgarians The European Union is again going to call on Canada to drop visa requirements from visitors from the Czech Republic, Romania and Bulgaria. The bloc’s foreign affairs chief, Catherine Ashton, said the issue would be raised at a Canada-EU summit at the start of May.

Speaking in Brussels, Baroness Ashton said it was not a matter of bilateral relations between Canada and the three countries, but a matter of EU-Canada relations. She said the EU’s aim was clear: visa-free travel to Canada for all its citizens. Ottawa introduced a visa regime for Czechs in July 2009 after a rise in the number of Czech Romany asylum seekers in Canada. It had already imposed the same restriction on people from Romania and Bulgaria, which both joined the European Union in 2007.