U.S. Embassy quotes privacy law

The United States Embassy here has issued a statement neither confirming nor denying the visa issues concerning Vice President Jewel H. Taylor.

The U.S. Embassy on Friday issued a statement quoting its privacy laws which forbids it from discussing a person’s visa applications status, immigration or citizenship status.

“U.S. privacy laws prohibit us from discussing any person’s visa application status, immigration status, or citizenship status with anyone other than the person in question,” the statement said

The embassy issued statement following inquiries from some local media institutions here about Mrs. Taylor’s alleged visa denial and subsequent reconsideration.

On Thursday March 8, 2018, a local daily reported that Vice President Taylor, estranged wife of ex-president Taylor was initially denied visa to enter the United States, but an appeal was made on her behalf by some influential persons for a reversal of the decision.

The U.S. does not issue visas to individuals who may have participated or indirectly participated in aiding or abetting war crimes.

This paper could neither confirm nor deny the report with the U.S. Embassy in Monrovia. However, Vice President Taylor’s office says her visa was still in process, and that she had neither been issued nor denied visa.

“The Vice President has not been denied US visa, but is rather undergoing the normal Administrative process by the US Embassy near Monrovia,” a statement from the Vice President’s office Thursday reads.

The office further denies that she pleaded with the US States Department to reconsider the reported decision not to issue the visa, saying “…at no time did Hon. Jewel Howard-Taylor issue any communication pleading with the US Embassy to grant her visa after being denied”.

However, it confirms excerpts of the local daily’s report that the Vice President is currently in Ghana, awaiting formal response from the embassy on her request to travel to the USA to attend the sixty-second session of the Commission on the Status of Women.

The release notes that the event is expected to take place at the United Nations Headquarters in New York from 12 to 23 March 2018.

Liberians both at home and abroad are requesting for the establishment of war crimes court in the country to prosecute people who committed heinous crimes during the 14-year civil war as recommended by the former TRC.