Sweden - Immigration agreement for Greens and government

Published: 27 Mar 08 08:49 CET
Online: http://www.thelocal.se/10728/

The Swedish government and the Green Party are to present a joint proposal on Thursday for new rules governing labour force immigration.

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Under the terms of the proposal, Sweden would not send anybody back to their homeland if they had managed to secure employment.

"This is the biggest reform of Swedish immigration policy for several decades," said Migration Minister Tobias Billström and Green Party group leader Mikaela Valtersson in a jointly penned article in Thursday's Dagens Nyheter.

If a job seeker outside the EU receives a concrete offer of work from a Swedish employer, this will in future be enough to secure permits for residency and employment.

The proposal also sets longer time limits for residence and work permits. The first permit will last two years. If the applicant still has work after this period, the permit will be extended by a further two years.

After four years, an applicant will be eligible for a permanent residence permit.

"From now on, no labour force immigrant will be forced to go home despite having work," said Billström and Valtersson.

The government and the Greens also want to make it easier for job seekers to attain visas to travel to Sweden for interviews.

Under the new regulations, an applicant who is offered employment will no longer have to return home to apply for permits to live and work in Sweden.

TT/The Local (news@thelocal.se/08 656 6518)



Source The Local.se

Episode IV: Learning a foreign language by Livemocha

We (me and my fellow Puntino) have talked yet about some communities useful for English Learning.

In this forth episode I wanna talk about LiveMocha.



LiveMocha it's a well organized community for language learning.
This site use an interactive way of practicing a foreign tongue, through a very smart method.

You can practice at the same time your skills in, reading, writing, listening, speaking.
For instance you can practice and traing your speaking abilities recording a short dialogue.
The other members of community are able to listen to it and send you some advice or simply correct mistakes you have done.

And all this not only for English but for other languages too! (French, Spanish and so on)

IMHO the best featurs of the mocha are three.

1) It is free (obviously :P)
2) It is very simple and useful
3) It is a cosmopolitan community.


So....see you around the mocha ;)