Novaya Guta border checkpoint
The PRINEX system along the Belarusian-Ukrainian border has been launched thanks to co-operation between Belarus’ State Customs Committee and Ukraine’s State Fiscal Service, through the EU’s Integrated Border Management Flagship Initiative to promote integrated border control. Over 4m Euros has been spent on purchasing specialised computer equipment, on developing the system, on staff training and on improving information-technological and communication infrastructure at all vehicle checkpoints along our common border.
The project is unique in its efficiency and is not yet operational across the whole EU, or within the post-Soviet space. Belarusian-Ukrainian cargo flow will be fully screened before reaching a checkpoint, as Gomel custom’s staff comment. They tell us, “When a vehicle arrives at Ukraine’s Novye Yarilovichi, the driver provides documents for registration and, almost simultaneously, the same information is passed to Belarusian Novaya Guta (or vice versa). PRINEX uses a mirror reflection principle.”
This should significantly enhance efficiency at custom’s control and raise the transparency of operations, reducing the risk of human error, and speeding up crossing time at the Belarusian-Ukrainian border. In September alone, around 7,500 trucks crossed the border (in both directions). Clearly, PRINEX’s advantages cannot be overestimated.
By Violetta Dralyuk
