BANJUL, June 24 (Xinhua) -- Gambia will introduce the biometric passport to discourage forgery and easy access to passports in the West African nation, the immigration department told Xinhua on Monday.
The new passport will cost 100 U. S. dollars and will serve for five years before expiry.
If all goes well, it will be the second time for the West African nation to introduce biometric documentation after the national identity card, which was put to use in 2011.
Also known as a digital passport, it is a combined paper and electronic passport that contains biometric information to authenticate the identity of travellers. Its characteristics are documented in the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).
"The passport's critical information is both printed on the data page of the passport and stored in the chip. Public Key Infrastructure is used to authenticate the data stored electronically in the passport chip making it expensive and difficult to forge when all security mechanisms are fully and correctly implemented," an official said.
"We want to discourage forgery of documents in the country and also to avoid easy access to passport by the young people who do take clandestine journey to Europe through back way," said the immigration official.
More than 2,000 young Gambians took hazardous journey to Europe through the West African nation of Mali, via Niger to Libya, before they could reach their final destinations at an average cost of more than 1,500 dollars.
Childhood in an isolated sterile room
Feedback
RSS
