An agreement among many European Union countries whereby the borders between them may be crossed without border formalities but for which citizens of various other countries need an overall visa.
Schengen is a small village in south-eastern Luxembourg, near the tripoint where the borders of Luxembourg, Germany and France meet. It gave its name to an agreement among many European countries whereby the borders between them may be crossed without border formalities but for which various outside countries need an overall visa.
As of 2014, the countries inside the Schengen area are:
austria, belgium, czech-republic, denmark, estonia, finland, france, germany, greece, hungary, iceland, italy, latvia, liechtenstein, lithuania, luxembourg, malta, netherlands, norway, poland, portugal, slovakia, slovenia, spain, sweden and switzerland.
Overseas territories are mostly not included.
