RIYADH, 14 March — The United States Embassy has announced revised procedures for the issuance of US passports in compliance with new US government regulations. The revised procedures are being implemented in the interest of enhanced security and will lead to uniformity in the passports carried by all US citizens.
Effective April 8, 2002, any American citizen residing or traveling abroad who requires issuance of a US passport will be provided with a state-of-the-art passport incorporating a photo-digitized image and other enhanced security features. US missions will achieve this goal by transferring their passport issuance function to a domestic US passport facility. This will increase processing times at US missions.
In the past, US passport renewals in the Kingdom could often be made in as little as 48 hours. That will no longer be possible. However, the US Department of State has emphasized that they are committed to ensuring that American citizens receive secure documents in a timely manner.
American citizens must now be certain to apply early for renewal of expiring passports. Passport application information is available on the US Embassy’s home page on the Internet at http://usembassy.state.gov/riyadh. The US Department of State and its Foreign Service posts will use express mail service to move accepted passport applications and issued photo-digitized passports between the US and overseas.
American Embassy officials have estimated that under the new procedures the embassy in Riyadh and the consulates in Jeddah and Dhahran will be able to deliver a new photo-digitized passport to the bearer approximately 10 days after application is made.
US diplomatic missions will continue to issue passports in emergency cases. Such passports will be limited in validity, and cannot be extended. Bearers of these documents will be required to exchange their limited validity passports for full-validity photo-digitized passports upon completion of their emergency travel, either through passport facilities in the US or US embassies and consulates abroad.
