Slovenia, along with Slovakia and Hungary, is expected to sign an agreement with Austria in November for boosting cross-border police cooperation following the expansion of the Schengen border-free zone, diplomatic sources in Brussels said on Friday.
Slovenia and Austria already have joint police patrols, while the signing of the agreement will confirm the intention of countries to carry on this cooperation even after Slovenia joins the Schengen zone.
Interior Minister Dragutin Mate said on Friday that the two countries have already harmonised the agreement and now need to sort out the details of its signing.
While Austria already has agreements with Slovenia, Slovakia and Hungary on police cooperation, the new agreements will confirm the political commitment to continue this once the three countries join the Schengen zone.
"After all, the Schengen regulations tasks countries with such cooperation," Mate said. According to him, the agreement would also be a political statement, letting citizens know that Schengen expansion will enhance security in the EU and its members. The confirmation of the agreement comes after Austrian Interior Minister Guenther Platter said on Tuesday that the Austrian army and police would continue to play an active role in the border area until at least September 2008.
Mate stressed that retaining supervision in the interior parts of EU member states is needed despite the introduction of the Schengen regime. This is the purpose of the planned agreement, he said.
Police are to pay special attention to the border regions after Schengen expansion, said Mate, speaking over the phone from Bulgaria, where he attended a Salzburg Forum meeting. He added that the two countries will have to agree on how to carry out alternating border controls given that neither will have checks along the whole border.
In a related development, Slovenian police officials today said they were convinced that the final visit by the team evaluating Slovenia's readiness to join the Schengen area will remove the final hurdle to Schengen membership. "Given the experience from previous evaluations and the response from the evaluation team, we're convinced that a positive grade will be forthcoming," Dusan Kerin of the Criminal Police Department told a press conference in Ljubljana.
Speaking after the conclusion of the visit, which was dedicated to the implementation of the Schengen Information System (SIS), Kerin said that the team - who were in Slovenia from Sunday to Thursday - scrutinised the use of the SIS on the ground.
The team visited the Ljubljana international airport, the Moste police station, the border crossing at Obrezje and several other police outfits at or near the border with Croatia.
The official added that the SIS includes data on people and property, giving border officials the chance to check up on a person and get a result in less than two seconds. He added that border police got some 500 positive hits since the system entered into use, mainly regarding people who are forbidden to enter the Schengen zone.
The evaluators' assessment will be debated by the competent working group on 25 and 26 October and Marko Gasperlin of the General Police Directorate believes that the assessment will be positive. The final decision on eliminating border checks on Slovenia's land and sea borders is expected to be taken by EU's interior ministers at a meeting on 7 and 8 November.
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