Background:

Within the framework of standard security checks carried out as part of the admission procedure, the Ministry of the Interior of the Czech Republic, as the national immigration service, verifies whether applicants for long-stay visas and residence permits have clean criminal records in countries where they reside. For this purpose, each applicant is required to submit a document proving the absence of their criminal history that is typically called “Criminal Record Certificate“, “Police Clearance Certificate“, “Extract from the Penal Register Record”, etc., and is usually issued by the Ministry of Justice, the court, the police, etc. The applicant is required to submit a criminal record certificate issued by a competent authority of a country of which they are a citizen, and any other country in which they have resided for a total of six months in the three years preceding the application.

In certain cases, the latter requirement imposes a significant administrative burden on applicants who have recently resided in other countries, including some categories of highly qualified mobile workers to whom Czechia provides preferential treatment and fast-tracking. To evaluate its security standards and strike the right balance between preventing security risks on the one hand and attracting talent and raising international competitiveness on the other, Czechia seeks to compare its national policy described above with policies and practices of other Member States.

Respondents:

22 EMN Member and Observer Countries provided a public answer to this ad hoc query.

Findings:

A preliminary analysis of the results of the ad hoc query shows that:

• Out of 22 responding countries, 16 countries (AT and HU (only for residence permits), BE, BG, HR, CY, CZ, EE (since January 2026 only), FR, EL (only for long-stay visas), LV, LT, LU, SK (for temporary residence or permanent residence), SI, ES) require applicants for long-stay visas and/or residence permits to submit criminal record certificates issued by the competent authorities of their country of citizenship. Some countries have exceptions for certain categories of applicants, including: stateless persons in BG; posted workers, students, researchers, or intra-corporate transferees in HR; applicants who have already submitted a certificate in a previous procedure in EE; applicants who enter from countries of visa-free regime in LV, etc.. In BE, a criminal record certificate is required for all categories of applicants, but exceptions could apply if the applicant can justify that they are unable to obtain the document. In FR, only two categories are subject to the requirement of providing a certificate: ‘corporate officers’ and ‘legal representatives of a company’.

• Out of 22 responding countries, 13 countries (AT and HU (only for residence permits), BE, BG, HR, CZ, EE (since January 2026 only), EL, LV, LT, LU, SK, ES) require applicants for long-stay visas and/or residence permits to submit criminal record certificates issued by the competent authorities of countries in which they have spent a certain period of time prior to lodging the application for the visa or residence permit. Some countries specify a minimum period of residence that generates this obligation (3 months for BE and SK, 6 months for CZ and LT, 1 year for BG, HR, EL, LV). In BE, applicants must provide certificates for every country in which they have resided for more than 3 months over the past 5 years prior to the application being made.

• Almost all countries that require a certificate require this document to be translated in their official language(s). In HR, an exception is made for digital nomads, who may provide documents in English. CZ makes exceptions for applicants admitted to government programmes of preferential economic migration.

• Only 2 countries (FI, DE) allow applicants to prove by any means other than a certificate or an affidavit the non-existence of their criminal record in their country of origin or countries in which they have previously resided. In these countries, the application forms for residence permits include questions on criminal records. 4 other countries (IT, NL, PL, SI) report relying on the Schengen Information System (SIS) alerts to screen applicants in the admission procedure.

For further details, please read the compilation of answers attached above.