Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 118.djvu/3847

 118 STAT. 3817 PUBLIC LAW 108–458—DEC. 17, 2004 SEC. 7205. INTERNATIONAL STANDARDS FOR TRANSLITERATION OF NAMES INTO THE ROMAN ALPHABET FOR INTER- NATIONAL TRAVEL DOCUMENTS AND NAME-BASED WATCHLIST SYSTEMS. (a) FINDINGS.—Congress makes the following findings: (1) The current lack of a single convention for translating Arabic names enabled some of the 19 hijackers of aircraft used in the terrorist attacks against the United States that occurred on September 11, 2001, to vary the spelling of their names to defeat name-based terrorist watchlist systems and to make more difficult any potential efforts to locate them. (2) Although the development and utilization of terrorist watchlist systems using biometric identifiers will be helpful, the full development and utilization of such systems will take several years, and name-based terrorist watchlist systems will always be useful. (b) SENSE OF CONGRESS.—It is the sense of Congress that the President should seek to enter into an international agreement to modernize and improve standards for the transliteration of names into the Roman alphabet in order to ensure 1 common spelling for such names for international travel documents and name-based watchlist systems. SEC. 7206. IMMIGRATION SECURITY INITIATIVE. (a) IN GENERAL.—Section 235A(b) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1225a(b)) is amended— (1) in the subsection heading, by inserting ‘‘AND IMMIGRA- TION SECURITY INITIATIVE’’ after ‘‘PROGRAM’’; (2) by striking ‘‘Attorney General’’ and inserting ‘‘Secretary of Homeland Security’’; and (3) by adding at the end the following: ‘‘Beginning not later than December 31, 2006, the number of airports selected for an assignment under this subsection shall be at least 50.’’. (b) AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS.—There are authorized to be appropriated to the Secretary of Homeland Security to carry out the amendments made by subsection (a)— (1) $25,000,000 for fiscal year 2005; (2) $40,000,000 for fiscal year 2006; and (3) $40,000,000 for fiscal year 2007. SEC. 7207. CERTIFICATION REGARDING TECHNOLOGY FOR VISA WAIVER PARTICIPANTS. Not later than October 26, 2006, the Secretary of State shall certify to Congress which of the countries designated to participate in the visa waiver program established under section 217 of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1187) are developing a program to issue to individuals seeking to enter that country pursuant to a visa issued by that country, a machine readable visa document that is tamper-resistant and incorporates biometric identification information that is verifiable at its port of entry. SEC. 7208. BIOMETRIC ENTRY AND EXIT DATA SYSTEM. (a) FINDING.—Consistent with the report of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, Congress finds that completing a biometric entry and exit data system as expeditiously as possible is an essential investment in efforts to protect the United States by preventing the entry of terrorists. 8 USC 1365b. Deadline. Deadline. VerDate 11-MAY-2000 13:54 Nov 10, 2005 Jkt 029194 PO 00000 Frm 00351 Fmt 6580 Sfmt 6581 C:\STATUTES\2004\29194PT4.001 APPS10 PsN: 29194PT4

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