The Latvian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in cooperation with the Office of Citizenship and Migration Affairs of the Ministry of Interior and the Honorary Consuls of Latvia will provide a chance for Latvian nationals living in Australia and New Zealand to apply for biometric passports and ID cards during the next visit of the Mobile Passport Unit from 9 October 2017 to 26 October 2017, the ministries have announced.
Biometric data will be collected in the Latvian Honorary Consulates in Australia:
Perth, 9-10 October;
Adelaide, 12-13 October;
Melbourne, 16-18 October;
Brisbane, 20 October;
Sydney, 22-24 October.
Latvian nationals permanently residing in New Zealand will have the possibility to apply for passports and ID cards in the Latvian Honorary Consulate in Auckland on 26 October.
So far more than 600 Latvian nationals have applied for a passport and an ID card during the previous visits of the Mobile Passport Unit to Australia and New Zealand.
This is the third time that the Foreign Ministry is organizing the visit of a Mobile Passport Unit to Australia and New Zealand. 633 applications for new ID documents were made during the previous visit in 2014.
And Latvia's ability to issue passsports in unlikely places really came to the fore in the case of Peter Greste, who was handed a passport in prison in Egypt as Latvia worked to free him after his conviction on trumped up charges.
