The Police Community and Media Relations Unit said yesterday the Ministry for Justice and Home Affairs is preparing itself for the entry in force of the second generation of the Schengen Information System, which it said constitutes an important aspect of the continued development in EU enhanced police cooperation, with new possibilities that will be available after the entry in force of the Lisbon Treaty.

The second generation of the Schengen Information System provides for new categories of alerts, including alerts on boats, aircraft and containers which are reported lost, stolen or misappropriated. The new system provides also new functionalities which will enhance significantly the abilities of law enforcement agencies in the Schengen area to fight trans-border serious crime. Contemporaneously, the legal instruments regulating this second generation of SIS entail extra obligations on Member States as regards statistics, reporting and data protection.

In 2008, the European Commission approved funding under the Transition Facility Programme amounting to about €101,600 for a project aiming to prepare the Malta Police Force for the correct implementation of the relevant EU instruments. This project has been implemented by the Malta Police Force with the assistance of experts from the SIReNE Bureau within the Italian Ministry of Interior. Its implementation started in June 2009 and was finalised during November 2009.

As part of the project, workshops and seminars have been held in Malta for which Maltese and Italian experts participated. Moreover, officers from the Malta Police Force have participated in various study visits in Italy.