USA visitors will be relieved to hear that Washington has finally made up its mind regarding machine readable passports. In an announcement last week The Secretary of State has granted a postponement until 26 October 2004, as the date by which Visa Waiver Programme travellers from 21 countries must present a machine-readable passport at a US port of entry to be admitted to the country without a visa. These countries are: Australia, Austria, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Monaco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, San Marino, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the UK.. Belgium, which is also a visa waiver country, was not eligible to receive this extension.
http://www.us-immigration.com