Student visa resumption likely soon: US State Dept spokesperson
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Washington: The United States announced that the pause on student visa interviews will end "sooner than later," urging applicants to continue their application process while monitoring updates on the resumption of regular services.
On Tuesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio ordered US missions worldwide to temporarily halt student visa interviews to allow for expanded scrutiny of applicants' social media activity.
US State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce indicated that an early end to the pause could provide relief for hundreds of thousands of students planning to pursue higher education in the US later this year.
With India being the largest source of international students in the US, Bruce’s remarks are expected to draw significant attention there.
“So right now, there might be some delay. And what I'm told to encourage people to do is to regularly check to see when those spaces open,” said Bruce at the daily news briefing. “So as opposed to, let me just say I would not be recommending that if this was going to be weeks or months. So if you're if you've applied for a visa and you want to please do so then there's no if you're not getting an appointment, just there's this online system you continually recheck to see when those spots might open.”
“I can't tell you immediately after some, you know, undetermined moment of an action, but I can tell you that it's something that will happen, perhaps sooner than later,” she added.
The Trump administration has expanded scrutiny of foreign students in US colleges and universities in the wake of political unrest that swept through campuses against Israel’s invasion of Gaza in response to the terrorist strike by Hamas in 2023 October.
The administration has targeted college authorities for not doing enough to prevent them and protect Jewish students and foreign students from participating in them.
(inputs from IANS)
