U.S. visa center registers lottery winners (10/05/97)

U.S. visa center registers lottery winners

PORTSMOUTH, N.H. - The National Visa Center has registered the winners of the DV-98 lottery. The Diversity Lottery was conducted under the regulations of Section 203(c) of the Immigration and Nationality Act and makes available 55,000 permanent resident visas annually to persons from countries with low rates of immigration to the United States.

Almost 100,000 applicants have been registered and notified and may now make applications for immigrant visas. Since it is likely that some of the first 55,000 persons registered will not pursue their cases to visa issuance, this larger figure should ensure that all DV-98 numbers will be used.

Applicants registered for the DV-98 program were selected at random from the approximately 4.7 million qualified entries received during the one-month application period that ran from February 3 through noon on March 5. An additional 1.3 million applications received inside the mail-in period were disqualified because applicants failed to properly follow directions.

The visas have been apportioned among six geographic regions with a maximum of 3,850 visas (7 percent of the 55,000 total) available to persons born in any single country. During the visa interview, principal applicants must provide proof of a high school education or its equivalent, or show two years of work experience in an occupation that requires at least two years of training or experience within the past five years.

Those selected will need to act on their immigrant visa applications quickly. Applicants should follow the instructions in their notification letter and must fully complete the information requested. Registrants living in the United States who wish to apply for adjustment of their status must contact the Immigration and Naturalization Service nearest to their place of residence.

Once the total of 55,000 visa numbers have been used, the program for fiscal year 1998 will end. Selected applicants who do not receive visas by September 30, 1998, will derive no further benefit from their DV-98 registration. Similarly, spouses and children accompanying or following to join DV-98 principals are only entitled to derivative DV status only until September 30, 1998.

Only participants in the DV-98 program who were selected for further processing have been notified. Those who have not received notification should assume their names were not selected. The application period for next year's DV-99 lottery will be October 24 to November 24.

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