Sections of the fence are not permitted. Repair crews walk the barrier facility daily and, where necessary, respond immediately, including securing specific sections.
This was established during a tour of the barrier facility on the border between Bulgaria and Turkey, which the Prime Minister Dimitar Glavchev did today together with the Minister of Defense Atanas Zapryanov, Minister of Internal Affairs Atanas Ilkov, Chief of Defense Admiral Emil Eftimov and the director of the high commissioner “Border Police” Anton Zlatanov.
With a helicopter, they did an aerial inspection of the fence, then went around the border near Lesovo, where they saw the benefits of the integrated video surveillance system in action.
For the part of the border where such a system does not yet exist, a contract with a contractor for its construction is expected to be concluded within 10 days, said the director of the Border Police, High Commissioner Anton Zlatanov .
Since the beginning of the year, border guards have prevented more than 44,000 attempts by migrants to enter the country illegally. The busiest border in terms of migration is still the Bulgarian-Turkish border, where it accounts for more than 99% of the total migration pressure.
At the same time, thanks to the measures taken by the General Directorate of the Border Police, the pressure of migration has decreased by 71% compared to the same period in 2023. A total of 2,062 people were detained by authorities Bulgarian borders when they entered Bulgaria illegally. Most of them are citizens of Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq.
2,723 third-country nationals were detained when trying to leave the country illegally, which is a 35% increase in the number of arrests compared to the same period in 2023. internally, 67% fewer migrants were detained as a result of the measures taken.
All the integrated surveillance systems in the General Directorate of Public Security are currently supported by European funds, of which more than BGN 11,000,000 have been used.
2 new systems will be built at the beginning of 2025 – one already with European funding, the second monitoring system with secured budget funds.
The two new systems will cover the unequipped sections on the border between Bulgaria and Turkey. The necessary technical and mobile monitoring systems are provided. Cars were purchased for border control, and BGN 27,000,000 was used for that.
There is no shortage of “Border Police”, the High Commissioner Anton Zlatanov was also generic, contradicting the claims that appeared in the public space that people are not willing to work in the system.
For the additional 1,264 full-time positions allocated, 8 competitions for civil service recruitment in the Ministry of Internal Affairs for 400 vacant positions are currently announced. 2477 sets of documents were submitted for the competitions. This will, to a large extent, ensure the necessary staffing in the General Directorate of Internal Affairs and Communications.
To ensure the maintenance of the engineering barrier facility, the adjacent road, the integrated monitoring systems, necessary funding in the amount of BGN 47,705,000 was requested.
Additional funding of at least 60,000,000 is required for the maintenance of the integrated systems, new handheld and mobile thermal imaging scanners, 15 new mobile surveillance systems equipped with next generation techniques, as well as for unmanned aerial vehicles .
