⚠️ Visas Denial Cases for U.S War Veterans in Colombia – 2022

Retirees are one of the types of foreigners who most decide to settle in Colombia. And for many years, we have helped hundreds of retired men and women from different countries around the world, especially from the United States, settle in Colombia by obtaining a Visa M-Type: Retirement.

Most of the time, the retirees we receive have completed the years of service in their different activities and the age required by the government to obtain their social security or private pension.

However, we also receive a representative number of members of the Veterans Affairs Administration each month. They are interested in coming to retire in Colombia and enjoying the benefits that accredit the country as one of the best countries to retire, according to International Living’s Global Annual Retirement Index 2022. Information that you can find detailed in our blog: Retirement Visa in Colombia: How to get it, costs, and more.

Let us remember that the general requirements to obtain a retirement visa in 2022 are:

• Valid passport.
• The document demonstrates legal stay in the country.
• Digital photo with a white background without accessories.
• Updated pension certificate, apostilled, legalized, and/or translated, as the case may be. In addition, the certificate must prove monthly income greater than three legal minimum wages in force, COP 3,000,000 / USD 800 approximately.

So, for the members of the Veterans Affairs Administration, in the course of the year 2022, it has become a requirement to provide additional documents, such as:

• Certificate of discharge from the service.
• Medical certificate by the entity from which the foreigner receives the pension payment, indicating the percentage of disability and the details of the physical and mental health of the veteran, in addition to showing the type of treatments that the foreigner is following for their well-being.

However, during the last week, we have received an alert due to Visas Denial Cases for U.S War Veterans by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Colombia (Cancillería) and different consular sections of Colombia in the United States.

What is happening about Visas Denial Cases for U.S War Veterans?

The Cancillería is quite demanding with retirees.

What is happening is that the Ministry makes a deep and detailed analysis of each case. First, they seek to review the background of the foreigner and their state of physical and mental health. So depending on this, the government decides if granting the visa to the foreign war veteran represents a national inconvenience and then finally they give the visas denial for U.S War Veterans.

What does «National Inconvenience» mean?

The national inconvenience in these cases is associated with two main events:

• Possibly endangering the security and tranquility of the people who live in Colombia.

• Contributes a negative burden to the Colombian health system. This is associated with the denial of visas in 2020 since, from that moment on, the Colombian government realized that a high percentage of foreigners residing in Colombia do not contribute to the country’s social security system.

What are the aggravating circumstances that cause the denials?

• Disability is more significant than 60%.
• The handling of weapons during wars and combat in the army.
• Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
• Medical diagnoses reveal psychological disorders associated with anger, depression, anxiety, irritability, and difficulty socializing.

What does a visa denial mean?

The denial of a visa is the final rejection by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the application.

It is essential to keep in mind that once a visa application has been denied, we will only be able to present a new application after six months, counted from the moment of the denial.

In addition, against the decision to deny a visa by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, there is no appeal, according to Chapter 2, Article 79 of Resolution 6045 of 2017.

What are we recommending to our clients in these cases?

By the moment, our recommendation is to suspend the visa processes of those war veterans who meet the aggravating factors listed above. This is to avoid an imminent denial. Will be better to wait for the situation with the Colombian government to be more precise about granting visas for retirees.

At expatgroup.co, we will remain attentive to the development of this topic, and we will keep our expat community informed through our blog articles and our Newsletter.