WASHINGTON, D.C. -- U.S. Senator Daniel K. Inouye announced that the Senate approved the House-Senate Conference Report to the Fiscal Year 1998 Commerce, Justice, State, and the Judiciary Appropriations bill which includes an amendment that would immediately restore, for a 5-year period, the authority for the U.S. Embassy in Manila to complete the naturalization process of approximately 12,000 remaining applications which were properly filed under Section 405 of the Immigration Act of 1990. This legislation does not extend the application period, and naturalization is available only to those applicants who were found by the Recovered Personnel Division and the Guerrilla Affairs Division of the U.S. Army to deserve benefits from the federal government.

Section 405 of the Immigration Act of 1990 was enacted to make naturalization under Section 329 of the Immigration and Nationality Act available to those Filipino World War II veterans whose military service during the liberation of the Philippines makes them deserving of United States citizenship. The authority to allow the veterans to be naturalized in the Philippines was first granted under Section 113 of the Fiscal Year 1993 Department of Commerce, Justice, State, and the Judiciary Appropriations Act.

On January 21, 1997, Senator Inouye introduced S. 118, which provides for the completion of the naturalization process in the Philippines for certain Filipino war veterans. The authority to naturalize in the Philippines has now expired.

The original intent of Congress in providing the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) with authority to naturalize applicants in the Philippines was to relieve the unnecessary hardships that Section 405 applicants would encounter by having to travel to the United States for an interview and naturalization ceremony, since many are elderly and have no relatives in the United States. However, this does not preclude the veterans from traveling to the United States for this purpose.

In addition, the Congress included Inouye's amendment to extend and expand the Immigrant Investor Visa Pilot Program initiated by the Commerce, Justice, State Appropriations Subcommittee in 1993. This amendment will increase the number of visas allocated to the program from 300 to 3000 and extend the pilot program for two additional years. The increased allocation would not result in any net increase in the number of visas authorized for alien investors, it would merely be apportioned from the 10,000 visas already allocated to the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) for the program in total. The two year extension would permit the program to continue to grow and demonstrate its value.

Under the Pilot Program, regional centers designated by the INS are authorized to process applications and ensure compliance with INS requirements of the investment of at least $500,000 and the creation of at least 10 new jobs in new commercial enterprises located within high unemployment threshold areas.

Section 610 of the Commerce, Justice, State, and the Judiciary Appropriations Act of 1993, directed the Secretary of State and Attorney General to set aside 300 visas each year for a five year period to create the pilot Program, implementing the immigrant investor preference category provisions contained in section 203(b)(5) of the Immigration and Naturalization Act. The Pilot Program is scheduled to expire on September 30, 1998.

The measure will now be transmitted to the White House to await President Clinton's signature.