Articles - US green card lottery 2012 registration ends soon

The one month registration period for submitting an entry to register for the US 'green card' lottery 2012, known as the Diversity Immigrant Visa (DV) Program, will end at noon on 3 November 2010, Eastern Daylight time.

The DV programme allows qualifying foreign nationals to become lawful permanent residents of the United States based on guidelines and various criteria.

For DV-2012, persons born in the following countries are not eligible to apply: Brazil, Canada, China(mainland), Colombia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, India, Jamaica, Mexico, Pakistan, Peru, Philippines, Poland, United Kingdom (except Northern Ireland) and its dependent territories and Vietnam.

These countries are ineligible as within the last five years a total of more than 50,000 immigrants to the US came from each of them. However, applicants may still be able to enter if their spouses are from eligible countries or if their birth in an ineligible country occurred while their parents were not residents of that country.

Persons born in Hong Kong SAR, Macau SAR and Taiwan are also eligible to enter.

All entrants must meet the education and work experience requirements and comply with other criteria in order to qualify for US permanent residence.