The two countries say they will cooperate on border protection.
Croatian Interior Minister Vlaho Orepić met in Budapest with Minister Interior of Hungary Sandor Pinter. They discussed current security challenges in Southeast Europe, migrations, border security and the flow of traffic on the Croatian-Hungarian border crossings, reports index.hr on February 21, 2017.
After the meeting, Minister Orepić said that Croatia and Hungary were countries which live in a common security space. In that spirit, Orepić said he came to Budapest to discuss with his Hungarian counterpart open issues and how to improve and enhance direct cooperation between the two countries in relation to security issues, according to a statement issued by the Interior Ministry.
“As for security measures, we will very soon start with the implementation of systematic controls at our borders, both on the internal borders of the European Union, as well as on the external borders. The measures relate to the control of each person in order to determine their identity, and thus we can expect a certain reduction in the flow across the borders. In order to minimize the consequences of these truly necessary and obvious safety measures, we have met and agreed that police director generals will define the elements for direct cooperation at border crossings”, said Minister Orepić.
He also announced that the cooperation would begin with joint exercises whose results would be taken as the basis for determining specific measures and procedures at border crossings.
Orepić added that he wanted to express his gratitude to Hungary for its support for Croatia’s accession to the Schengen Area. “We have also briefly touched upon migrant crisis and migrant flows, but in that area we already have exceptional collaboration”, said Orepić.
The meeting at the Hungarian Interior Ministry was also attended by director general of the Hungarian police Karoly Papp and deputy state secretary in charge of EU and International Affairs Matyas Hegyaljai. Croatian delegation included, in addition to Minister Orepić, Zoran Ničeno, acting head of the Border Department, and Martina Cvjetko Ljutić, acting head of European and International Affairs and Translation Department.
