The European Commission notified EU governments about the latest measures on consular protection.
1. EU Emergency Travel Document
EU citizens who happen to lose their passport when travelling outside the EU will be able to request a single-journey document which will be valid for 15 days. As of the end of 2025, the EU Emergency Travel Document (EUTD) will be issued by EU countries’ embassies and consulates to unrepresented citizens.
Design for the new EU Emergency Travel Document👀⤵️
— EU Justice (@EU_Justice) December 12, 2022
From December 2025 onwards, this document will be issued to EU citizens if they lose their passport🛂when travelling outside the EU.🧳✈️
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➡️https://t.co/YOtKbCJCbx#ConsularProtection pic.twitter.com/TP5XArgiIP
The EU Emergency Travel Document will offer EU citizens a secure and reliable way of returning home should they lose their passport while travelling abroad.
Didier Reynders, Commissioner for Justice
EU citizens are entitled to seek help from the embassy or consulate of another EU country, in case they face hardship and need assistance outside the EU. However, there are only three countries where all the EU member states are represented: China, Russia and the United States.
2. Security standards
Nevertheless, EU citizens can obtain emergency travel documents from embassies or consulates of EU countries other than their own since 1996. The new unification presented by the EU executive attempts to ensure that citizens’ data isn’t jeopardized in the process. According to the Commission, the old format did not meet modern security standards, opening up the risk of fraud and counterfeiting, and some nations stopped using it. With the new system, EU governments will also be able to issue the new EU Emergency Travel Document to their own citizens, reducing production costs and raising awareness of the document.
