World Passport
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The World Passport is a document issued by the World Service Authority, a private, non-profit organization based in Washington, D.C., purportedly under the authority of Article 13, Section 1, of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. World Passports have allegedly been accepted on a de facto, case-by-case basis by over 150 countries and, at one time or another, on an explicit, legal or de jure basis by Burkina Faso, Ecuador, Mauritania, Tanzania, Togo and Zambia. However, Burkina Faso withdrew its de jure recognition of World Passports in 1992, and there is evidence going back to 1996 that Zambia has also withdrawn its recognition. Procedures for verifying the identity of applicants are lax, and passports issued by the World Service Authority have been mentioned in U.S. indictments for fraud and providing material support to terrorists. Canada[1], New Zealand[2], Switzerland[3] and the United States[4] have all stated that they do not recognize such documents because they are issued by a private organization, not a competent government authority, and thus do not meet the definition of a passport. It is unclear whether any country currently accepts WSA passports.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- What's a World Passport? article by Daniel Engber in slate.com (March 24, 2006)
- The World Passport on the World Service Authority website
