Palanca contact point inaugurated at Moldovan-Ukrainian border

Chisinau, 7 September /MOLDPRES/ - The Palanca contact point was inaugurated at the joint border crossing point Palanca-Mayaki-Udobnoye on 6 September. Its task is to efficiently and quickly manage the activities at the Moldovan-Ukrainian border.

The creation of the Palanca contact point will allow carrying out a quick exchange of information between the Border Police of Moldova and the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine, by providing assistance in assessing the situation at the common border. The exchange of information is made to monitor people and transport means which cross the state border, emergency situations in the frontier zone, infringements or attempts to violate the legislations of the party states while crossing the state border, infringements of the border regime, etc. Thus, decision-makers will be able to prevent such phenomena as illegal migration, trafficking of people, forgeries in travel documents, etc. At the same time, the exchange of data could be carried out also in other sectors of common interest.

„The Palanca contact point will substantially contribute to tightening the security of the Moldovan-Ukrainian border, as well as to the process of institution’s development and modernization. Certainly, the work of the contact point will considerably improve the good-neighbour relations between Moldova and Ukraine and not only. It is also about national security, public order, economic well-being of the two countries, including the mutual support in the prevention and combating of the transnational organized crime,” the deputy head of the Moldovan Border Police, Valentin Fiodorov, has said at the inauguration ceremony.

Starting from 10 July 2019, the Palanca contact point has worked in testing regime. So far, 38 requests have been processed, most of which regarding the getting of operative information on the crossing of the state border by persons and transport means, as well as the existence of nominal confinements on citizens.

The setting up of the Palanca contact point represents one of the major goals achieved within the project titled, Integrated border management between Moldova and Ukraine by encouraging joint border control at border crossing points. The project is financed by the European Union through the Eastern Partnership’s pilot initiative on integrated management of the border and is implemented by the International Organization for Migration, with the support of the EU Border Assistance Mission for Moldova and Ukraine.