"I am glad that we will have stronger support from the European Union in the control of our and European borders", Croatian MEP Tonino Picula concluded during the discussion on the Report on the Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on the European Border and Coast Guard.
Picula was the initiator of the successful enlargement of the European Coastal and Border Guard Schengen Area at the EU's external borders, including the Republic of Croatia, and stressed that the new agency would help to better border protection in order to preserve the free movement within the Union. So the Croatian external border is protected as schengen broder, and the Republic of Croatia has at its disposal the funds of the European Border and Coast Guard, which greatly facilitates the work of border officials.
The European Border and Coast Guard consists of the border and coastal police of the Member States and the Agency for the European Border and Coast Guard, Frontex, and was established in the fall of 2016.
"Since I come from Croatia, the country with the longest foreign land border in the EU, I particularly support the work of the Agency on the outermost borders of the Union, not only of the Schengen area from which we are still enclosed by the barbed wire", he emphasized.
Picula also supported a new contingent of ten thousand border guards who can help the country within a maximum of five days if it faces the increased influx of migrants at the border.
"The agency does not only support, it will coordinate actions at the external borders and, taking fundamental rights into account, will more actively participate in processing asylum applications and returning those who do not meet the conditions", Picula said.
Only four months after Croatia's accession to the Schengen Information System, 75 million controls were carried out and over 4000 offenses were identified. This proves the importance of Croatia as a partner in securing the external borders of the European Union and justifies its sooner connection to the Schengen area, for which Picula proposed and endorsed the political support in the European Parliament as soon as Croatia fulfills all the conditions.
See the speech on the video.
Read about it on the link.
