Schengen visa - status due to lockdown

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The official France Visas website provides the following information on Covid-19 and visas:

Because of the COVID-19 health crisis, France has stopped issuing visas until further notice. This decision applies to all visa requests (Schengen short-stay visas, long-stay visas for France, and visas for overseas France). It also applies to applications for which appointments have already been made.

The validity of French residence permits, long-stay visas and receipts for applications to renew residence permits expiring between 16 March and 15 May 2020 has been extended for three months. If you have one of these documents and are stuck outside of France because of disruption to air travel, you will therefore be able to enter or return to France once the situation allows.

If you are in France on a short-stay visa which is going to expire and you cannot return to your country of origin, either because that country has prohibited entry from France for health reasons or because flights have been suspended, for example, you can, in case of justified urgency, enjoy an extension of your short-stay visa (up to 90 days) or a provisional residence permit. You are invited to make contact with the prefecture in the area where you are living to extend your short-stay visa or receive a provisional residence permit.

There are special provisions for people stuck in France (even on short-stay visas) and for people who were about to move or return to France (with a long-stay visa or residence permit) but nothing regarding short-stay visas that have not been used. This strongly suggests your visa will simply expire and you will have to reapply (and pay the fee again) whenever this becomes possible again.

Of course, other measures could be adopted later but it's likely that this won't be considered a priority. It's also conceivable that restrictions would be lifted gradually and the French ministry for Foreign Affairs would then want to reevaluate your application in light of the new rules rather than let you travel on a visa granted before the scale of the pandemic became clear.

So the only option available to you at the moment is to wait and to consider than all fees you paid are lost.

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