Foreign citizens living in Estonia may get the right to contest visa denials in Estonian courts, Baltic News Service reports.
The cabinet is to discuss an amend to the Aliens Act prompted by a European Court of Justice (ECJ) decision from December 2017.
The ECJ found that EU law obliges its member states to provide for legal recourse for challenging visa denial decisions.
Those who had been denied a visa would then be able to take the case to an administrative court in Estonia, if the amend becomes law.
Currently, any foreign citizen wanting to challenge a visa denial would need to use an appeals system where the first challenge is heard by the organization which rejected the visa application, such as the Police and Border Guard Board (PPA) or one of Estonia’s diplomatic missions, with a subsequent appeal needing to go to either the interior ministry or the foreign ministry.
The amend will therefore harmonize Estonian law and practice on visa denial with EU law.
— ERR.EE
