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Kevin Rudd, the new Prime Minister for Australia, has named and sworn in his Immigration Minister, Senator Christopher Evans. Senator Evans replaces Kevin Andrews, the former Immigration Minister for the former Prime Minister, John Howard. Senator Evans brings 25 years of service and experience in the Australian government to his new post. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd made immigration, migration and refugee policies a central theme of his election campaign, and major changes in policy from the previous government are expected.

From 30 November 2007, 320 Service Canada centers began offering in-person credentials referral services for migrants who were trained internationally. The Service Canada centers are part of the Canadian government's Foreign Credentials Referral Office (FCRO), and will help internationally trained immigrants who want to work in Canada to get the information they need to have their credentials assessed and recognized more quickly.

New figures from the United Kingdom's...

The United Kingdom's Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith, outlined Britain's new immigration system during a December 5th speech to the London School of Economics. She said that instead of the estimated 80 immigration routes that currently exist to enter the UK, there will now be a single, points-based immigration system. The Tier 1 portion is currently scheduled to begin "in March" of 2008, which will replace the current HSMP scheme. In a surprise announcement, Ms. Smith said that the Tier 3 portion of the system, designed for low-skilled workers, will be suspended. She indicated that the government expects migration from within the European Union to provide enough workers for labor market needs.

Economics professor Robert Wright, in an interview with The Daily Record, gave his assessment of some of the problems Scotland needs to address to resolve some of its population growth concerns. Wright estimates that 20,000 - 25,000 migrants...

The United Kingdom's Immigration and Borders Agency has announced plans to cut the validity period for visit visas from six months to three months. As part of the proposal, families would need to post a cash, £1,000 "visa bond" to ensure relatives leave when their visas expire. Also, use of visit visas for business will cease and instead a new class of visa will be created for that purpose. The proposals now go to consultation for public comments until March 10th of next year. The government is expected to issue its final proposals within 90 days after the end of the consultaion preiod. Similar measures had been considered in 2000, but were shelved after protests from immigrant communities.

According to the president of Universities UK, the United Kingdom's new points-based immigration system could make the country less attractive to foreign students. This could result in the loss tens of...

The Schengen Zone now encompasses a vast, visa-free area for 400 million people throughout 24 European countries. It is now possible to travel over 4,000 km (2,485 miles), from Tallinn in Estonia to Lisbon in Portugal, without encountering any border controls. Nine new countries joined the agreement as of 21 December 2007. For now, the scrapping of border controls will involve only land and sea borders. But, at the end of March 2008, it will be expanded to airports. Switzerland will become the 25th Schengen country when it joins next year. Cyprus, which also joined the European Union in 2004, has asked for a one year delay. Romania and Bulgaria, having just become EU members on 01 January 2007, will take some more time. The European Commission has invested about one billion Euros (?720m) on increasing security along the new EU frontiers. The Schengen Information Service (SIS) features an enormous...