EU | Ukraine
Moldova: EU creates hub to stop arms-smuggling out of Ukraine
Kyiv: European Union home affairs commissioner Yiva Johansson has announced creation of a hub in Moldova to battle organised crime, particularly arms smuggling from war-torn Ukraine.
The EU Support Hub for Internal Security and Border Management will focus on preventing weapons, most of which are supplied by Nato members, from being smuggled out of Ukraine and ending up with criminal gangs, reports EU observer.
Such smuggling will "feed into violence in the criminal networks in the European Union," Johansson said.
"It is hard to avoid weapons-smuggling. We try to keep track of them, but I would be lying if I said we will succeed. We failed after the war in Yugoslavia, and we can't prevent it now," an EU official, speaking anonymously, told EUobserver.
The hub will be a "one-stop-shop" allowing the EU's border guard agency Frontex to support local border agencies, and will enable Europol to share information, Johansson also said.
Aija Kalnaja, interim head of Frontex, said Moldova was chosen as a base of operations "because this is where the trafficking of weapons can come mostly."
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