The Kentucky Consular Center in Williamsburg, Kentucky has registered and notified the winners of the DV-2003 diversity lottery. The diversity lottery was conducted under the terms of section 203(c) of the Immigration and Nationality Act and makes available *50,000 permanent resident visas annually to persons from countries with low rates of immigration to the United States. Approximately 87,000 applicants have been registered and notified and may now make an application for an immigrant visa. Since it is likely that some of the first *50,000 persons registered will not pursue their cases to visa issuance, this larger figure should insure that all DV-2003 numbers will be used during fiscal year 2003 (October 1, 2002 until September 30, 2003).

Applicants registered for the DV-2003 program were selected at random from the approximately 6.2 million qualified entries received during the one-month application period that ran from Noon on October 1, 2001 through Noon on October 31, 2001. An additional 2.5 million applications were either received outside of the mail-in period or were disqualified for failing to properly follow directions. The visas have been apportioned among six geographic regions with a maximum of seven percent available to persons born in any single country. During the visa interview, principal applicants must provide proof of a high school education or its equivalent, or show two years of work experience in an occupation that requires at least two years of training or experience within the past five years. Those selected will need to act on their immigrant visa applications quickly. Applicants should follow the instructions in their notification letter and must fully complete the information requested.

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Registrants living legally in the United States who wish to apply for adjustment of their status must contact the Immigration and Naturalization Service for information on the requirements and procedures. Once the total *50,000 visa numbers have been used, the program for fiscal year 2003 will end. Selected applicants who do not receive visas by September 30, 2003 will derive no further benefit from their DV-2003 registration. Similarly, spouses and children accompanying or following to join DV-2003 principal applicants are only entitled to derivative diversity visa status until September 30, 2003.

Only participants in the DV-2003 program who were selected for further processing have been notified. Those who have not received notification were not selected. They may try for the upcoming DV-2004 lottery if they wish. The dates for the mail-in period for the DV-2004 lottery are scheduled from noon, Monday, October 7, 2002 until noon, Wednesday, November 6, 2002. Instructions on entering the DV-2004 program will be widely publicized in late July or early August 2002.

* The Nicaraguan and Central American Relief Act (NCARA) passed by Congress in November 1997 stipulated that up to 5,000 of the 55,000 annually-allocated diversity visas be made available for use under the NCARA program. The reduction of the limit of available visas to 50,000 began with DV-2000.

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The following is the statistical breakdown by foreign-state chargeability of those registered for the DV-2003 program:

AFRICA , ASIA, EUROPE , NORTH AMERICA , OCEANIA , SOUTH AMERICA, CENTRAL AMERICA, AND THE CARIBBEAN

Natives of the following countries were not eligible to participate in DV-2003: Canada, China (mainland-born, excluding Hong Kong S.A.R., and Taiwan), Colombia, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Haiti, India, Jamaica, Mexico, Pakistan, the Philippines, South Korea, United Kingdom (except Northern Ireland) and its dependent territories, and Vietnam.