2006 Diversity Visa Lottery Program Registration

Applications for the 2006 Diversity Visa (DV) Lottery will be accepted
between November 5, 2004 and January 7, 2005. Persons seeking to apply must
register electronically, online through the designated Internet website,
www.dvlottery.state.gov <http://www.dvlottery.state.gov> during the
registration period. The 2006 Diversity Visa Lottery marks the second year
that electronic registration is required. Paper entries and mail-in requests
for Diversity Visa Lottery registration are not accepted.
The Department of State implemented the electronic registration system last
year for the 2005 Diversity Visa Lottery to improve efficiency and make the
process less prone to fraud, thus making it less vulnerable to use by
persons who may pose a threat to the security interests of the United
States.
The congressionally mandated Diversity Immigrant Visa Program is
administered on an annual basis by the Department of State and conducted
under the terms of Section 203(c) of the Immigration and Nationality Act
(INA). Section 131 of the Immigration Act of 1990 (Pub. L. 101-649) amended
INA 203 to provide for a new class of immigrants known as "diversity
immigrants" (DV immigrants). The Act makes available 50,000 permanent
resident visas annually to persons from countries with low rates of
immigration to the United States.
The annual DV program makes permanent residence visas available to persons
meeting the simple, but strict, eligibility requirements. Diversity Visa
entries are chosen by a computer-generated random lottery drawing. The
visas, however, are distributed among six geographic regions with a greater
number of visas going to regions with lower rates of immigration, and with
no visas going to citizens of countries sending more than 50,000 immigrants
to the U.S. in the past five years. Within each region, no one country may
receive more than seven percent of the available Diversity Visas in any one
year.
For more information, follow this link:
http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2004/36613.htm