Addressing the 31st Annual Conference of the European Association of Airport and Seaport Police, Minister Galea said these regulations had been introduced following increased concern worldwide over maritime and aviation security.

He said Malta had made a commitment to meet these deadlines and was working hard to do so. Government has given the relevant authorities responsibility to implement the required measures to comply with all the international and EU legislation, he said.

“Today we face an ever-increasing challenge to protect our transport services and our nationals, not just against terrorism, but a whole series of threats such as piracy and armed robbery, drug smuggling, transportation of illegal migrants and other types of organised and terrorist crimes. This is not an easy challenge, but governments and organisations like the European Association of Airport and Seaport Police must work together to achieve the best possible solutions,” he said.

Mr Galea said the last time he had addressed the conference had been in Malta in 1999. Since then, he said, we have had to witness many disasters that have shaken the security of international transport worldwide in such a short time. He mentioned incidents such as that of the 11 September 2001 attack on the Twin Towers in New York and the attack on the USS Cole in Yemen.

These incidents have made it very clear to all governments worldwide that we must change our operational tactics and policies to help protect the world against such criminal acts, said Mr Galea.

He also mentioned Malta’s EU accession on Saturday: “This year is one of great importance to us.

Your conference here at this time only endorses Malta’s commitment to protect the most southern air and sea borders of the EU transport chain in these troubled times,” he said.