Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether she has had discussions with Cabinet colleagues on extending the 90-day period for collecting visas in Sudan.

Where our records confirm that a customer’s passport is being held in the Visa Application Centre (VAC) in Khartoum, UK Visas and Immigration have contacted all those customers that have been issued or refused visa applications in our VAC in Khartoum and offering them a letter confirming that their passport is securely stored and attaching a digital copy of their passport, that may help support their travel out of Sudan and into a third country.

Where our records show that the passport is held in Nairobi or Pretoria and a named individual (either the applicant or a designated 3^rd party) is identified to return the passport to outside of Sudan, the passport can be sent (to the named individual) by courier or for collection from another visa application centre. UK Visas and Immigration have contacted all those customers. For customers that have been able to exit Sudan, processes are in place to re-direct printing of their visa and endorsement on a Form for affixing a visa (FAV) to another VAC location of their choice for collection.

Where a customer would normally receive a 90-day vignette, we will defer issuing the vignette until they have been able to safely travel to a location where the vignette can be collected. If the vignette had already been issued and is due to expire, we will assist the customer in applying for a replacement vignette once they have been able to safely travel to a location where the vignette can be collected.