WASHINGTON (AP) – Despite the lobby by Caribbean tourism interests, the United States is pushing ahead with it passport requirement for virtually all air travellers entering the country, beginning January 23.

Until now, US citizens, travellers from Canada and Bermuda and some travellers from Mexico who have special border-crossing cards for frequent visitors were allowed to show other proofs of identification, such as drivers’ licences or birth certificates.

“The ability to misuse travel documents to enter this country opens the door for a terrorist to carry out an attack,” Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said in a statement yesterday.

Chertoff, who disclosed the effective date in an interview with The Associated Press on Tuesday, said the change was a crucial next step to helping ensure the nation’s security.

The department had been expected to institute the passport requirement for air travellers around the beginning of the year. Setting the date on January 23 pushes the start past the end-of-the-year holiday season.

“Each of these steps raises the bar to an attack. None of this is perfect. None of them is foolproof. But we’re always better off when we build higher levels of security,” he said.

“Right now, there are 8,000 different state and local entities in the US issuing birth certificates and driver’s licences,” Chertoff said. Having to distinguish phony from real in so many different documents “puts an enormous burden on our Customs and Border inspectors”, he said.

In a few cases, other documents still may be used for air entry into the US by some frequent travellers between the US and Canada, members of the American military on official business and some US merchant mariners.

Under a separate programme, Homeland Security plans to require all travellers entering the US by land or sea, including Americans, to show passports or an alternative security identification card when entering the US starting as early as January 2008.

The Homeland Security Department estimates that about one in four Americans has a passport. Some people have balked at the $97 (euro75.7) price tag.

The September 11 Commission said in its report, “For terrorists, travel documents are as important as weapons”.

The commission recommended strengthening security of travel documents. A 2004 law passed by Congress mandated the change to require passports as the only acceptable travel document, with few exceptions, but the exact date had been in question.

Canadian officials and some members of Congress from border states have expressed concern that the changes could interfere with travel and commerce.

Chertoff said his agency’s data revealed that in September 2006, 90 percent of passengers leaving from Canadian airports had passports. The department estimated that 69 per cent of US air travellers to Canada, 58 per cent of US travellers to Mexico, and 75 per cent of US travellers to the Caribbean hold passports.