BRUSSELS, April 1 (Xinhuanet) -- The warning of a US Congress representative that Washington is "unlikely" to postpone the deadline on biometric passports for the European Union (EU) citizens has put the EU at a nonplus.

    The United States is planning to demand visas from citizens from all 27 currently visa-free countries - including EU member states from Western Europe - if they fail to start issuing biometric passports by Oct. 26 this year.

    The machine-readable passports carry biometric information like facial image chips and fingerprint as required by the United States, who imposed the requirements after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in 2001.

    The US Congress originally set the deadline of Oct. 26, 2004 for the EU, and it later granted the extension of the deadline to Oct. 26 this year.

    Since only six EU members are ready to meet the deadline, the EU asked for the second delay of 10 months earlier this week.

    However, James Sensenbrenner, Republican chairman of the US congressional committee on immigration, made his doubts clear in a letter to the European Commission on Thursday.

    "The increased awareness and concern, of both the American public and most members of Congress regarding continued weakness in US border security, will make an additional extension difficult to accomplish," the letter said.

    He suggested the European Commission should "plan without the expectation that there will be an extension of the deadline."

    "We are examining what implication the letter has, ... we are potentially concerned and disappointed," said a spokesman for EU justice commissioner Franco Frattini on Friday.

    He confirmed that, if the deadline is not extended beyond October, it would mean that all European travelers currently benefiting from a visa-waiver scheme would lose that right unless they had the new hi-tech passports.

    "They would need to go through the ... very-time consuming visa process," said the spokesman. Enditem