Waterborne transport is a vital function for the liberated and borderless (transport)
market
of Europe. In potential it is a secure, safe and environmental-friendly way of
transport.
But not by itself. Transport by Ship (and container) is used to facilitate the types of
crime, mentioned in the “DGHOME EU Policy Cycle”, such as Illegal migration, human
trafficking, smuggle of drugs, arms and other goods, environmental crime and illegal
employment/labour abuse. Also the breach of safety- and environmental rules in the
domain of
shipping causes considerable risks for our society.
Therefore the level of security, safety and environmental protection in relation to
waterborne transport heavily depends on robust law- enforcement, that can function
cross-border. Waterborne transport operates in a borderless Europe (inland shipping) as
well
as world-wide (maritime shipping).
Law-enforcement authorities are way behind on the developments in relation to the
disappearance of borders in Europe and on the liberated transport market, and therefore
also
on the criminals that make use of these developments. This causes considerable risks for
security, safety and for the environment. It also causes a big risk for the integrity of
the
transport industry itself. Simply said: “For waterborne transport in Europe the borders
have
disappeared; for law-enforcement the borders largely still exist”. This problem is ever
increasing by new initiatives of the EU, aiming at more flexible and efficient transport
and
at a more liberated labour market. In order to keep the system in balance (economic- vs.
security- and safety interests) law enforcement must also be organized in a more
cross-border manner, sharing knowhow, intelligence and operational information.
AQUAPOL was established in 2002 and is fully dedicated to enhancement of safety and
security
on Europe’s main inland waterways as well as in the maritime domain. AQUAPOL aims at
prevention of risks by improvement by enhancement of cross-border law-enforcement
cooperation. As of 1-1-2016 AQUAPOL went through a mayor reform. Not all activities are
undertaken anymore at EU level. The cross-border operational activities are now a
responsibility of the so-called “HUBS”: clusters of countries in regions of Europe, that
have common priorities (related to their geographical position) and that have a strong
need
of day-to-day cross-border cooperation. At central level the AQUAPOL President and the
Director remain to take care of coordination between the HUBS and of all other processes
that need to be carried out at “AQUAPOL level”, such as lobby, contacts with external
stakeholders, IT-aspects of control databases and other expert systems and all other
activities required for a smooth functioning of the organisation. In 2016 the AQUAPOL
Work
Plan was introduced. Until then AQUAPOL had used a rather wide variety of documents and
papers, such as: policy plan, strategy document, action plan, annual calendar of
activities,
articles of association, membership lists etc. It was decided to bring all these
documents
together in one annual work plan. This plan contains all relevant information for
AQUAPOL
for a specific year and makes all other documents obsolete. The work plan is updated
every
year and contains all relevant information for that year. It is approved for the next
year
by the Council at the its annual December meeting. Also at this meeting the Council
deals
with the Annual Evaluation Report of the current year, which is prepared by the
Director. At
the end of every year the Work Plan for the next year and the Evaluation Report of the
past
year are published on the website. No other documents are published anymore. The Work
Plan
is the “Bible” for all members: one needs nothing else to be informed completely and
precisely. In order to make it very easy for the members to monitor progress of the
activities listed in the Work plan a monthly updated action list is also presented on
the
website.
