EU interior ministers adopted on Thursday a new time plan for bringing the Schengen Information System II (SIS II) on line for EU-15 members in June 2008, yet no date date has been set for the bloc's new members, said Slovenian Interior Minister Dragutin Mate after meeting his counterparts in Luxembourg.
This means that an alternative solution via the SIS I Plus system, proposed by Portugal, seems ever more feasible, Mate added, explaining that the ministers agreed to continue with activities geared towards the possibility of new EU members to adopt the SIS I Plus, a transitional information system.
"Technical details need to be harmonised, with an EU Council meeting in December expected to bring the final decision on the inclusion of new members," Mate said after the first day of an EU justice and interior ministers meeting, which focused on the expansion of the Schengen zone.
According to Mate, the SIS I Plus option is technically feasible. What needs to be examined now are the financial and organisational aspects. Another factor is the readiness of individual states he added and stressed his belief that Slovenia is well prepared on all levels.
According to him, the additional funds, necessary to make SIS I Plus operational, are "negligible if one considers the entire system". "What is needed is a cloning of the software of the existing Portuguese system, which would cost about EUR 1m per state," he explained.
New member states are all in favour of the Portuguese proposal to adopt the SIS I Plus. They are, however, worried about the fact that SIS II will not be operational as planned [by October 2007).
Meanwhile, European Commissioner for Justice, Liberty and Security Franco Frattini did not exclude the possibility of a timeline that would see new members entering at the end of 2008.
The European Commission noted that the financial costs of establishing the SIS I Plus system would have to covered by the system's member states, while in case of additional delays in setting up the SIS II, they would be entitled to some funding by the Commission.
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