On April 16th, 2024, Cătălin Predoiu, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Internal Affairs, had a meeting with Mrs. Nancy Faeser, Federal Minister of the Interior and for the Community of the Federal Republic of Germany, on the occasion of her visit to Romania, following the invitation of the Romanian Minister of Internal Affairs.
The discussions reconfirmed the excellent level of bilateral cooperation between the two states and demonstrate the firm commitment to strengthening European unity and security, in the context of current challenges.
The two sides welcomed the removal of internal air and sea border controls on March 31st, 2024, with the German official reconfirming support for the extension of the Schengen acquis to Romania and Bulgaria also for land borders as soon as possible.
The two dignitaries also addressed the issue of combating illegal migration and human trafficking at the European level, stressing upon the need to identify the best solutions in this regard. Minister Predoiu indicated, based on FRONTEX statistics, the fact that Romania effectively combats illegal migration, presented the measures taken and that will follow in this line of activity and assured the fact that we will continue to act according to the letter and spirit of the European normative framework the circumscribed actions migration policy – from the implementation of the new Pact for Migration and Asylum, to cooperation with immediate neighbors and other priority third states to achieve common goals.
Another topic on the bilateral agenda was police cooperation in the context of Germany’s hosting of the UEFA Men’s European Football Championship 2024, this summer. The Ministry of Internal Affairs will participate with specialized personnel in the joint effort of the European states, under the coordination of the German authorities, for the conduct of UEFA 2024 under optimal conditions from the point of view of security. Mr. Thomas Hitzlsperger, recently appointed „Football Ambassador” by the German authorities, participated in the press statements given by the two officials after the conclusion of the bilateral talks, on which occasion he conveyed his appreciation for Romania’s contribution to ensuring the security of this important event.
During the press conference, Mr. Ionuț Lupescu, the honorary president of C.S. Dinamo Bucharest emphasized the importance of football as an integrative social phenomenon in German society, as well as the efforts made by C.S. Dinamo Bucharest with the support of the Ministry of Interior for the construction of the new football arena of the Dinamo club.
At the end of the meeting, Minister Predoiu declared:
„In the Schengen file, Germany will continue to strongly support Romania. Federal Minister of the Interior Nancy Faeser will soon discuss this with Minister Karner and other fellow European ministers. Romania will assume a pro-active leadership role in applying the measures within the new Pact for migration and asylum.
We will support the cooperation between our departments specialized in civil protection, where we have a competent and well-integrated organisation between its structures and with the other structures of the MAI.
We will also support the German counterpart ministry during the European Men’s Football Championship to maintain public order and peace. In general, we will step up police cooperation with Germany.
During the official working lunch, we also discussed a number of serious phenomena and the need to combat them effectively. In the fight against drugs, we will multiply inter-country police cooperation initiatives. No European state can solve this problem alone, we must unite to defeat the drug traffickers. They come in huge quantities to Europe. Some „gateways” to Europe are in countries outside the European Union, and are then introduced through organized crime networks into the EU.
In some European states, this traffic is already generating a phenomenon of extreme violence associated with the traffic, explosions, threats and attempts on the lives of journalists who write about drug trafficking, addressed to the investigators. We cannot allow this happen in Europe.
At home on our territory, we asked the Romanian Police to continue and intensify the fight against drugs, to focus on the traffic „hubs”, on places where drugs are consumed, public or private, on organized crime clans. Organized crime clans are a kind of „malls” of crime, from blackmails, threats, pimping, human trafficking, drugs, theft and robberies, tax evasion and money laundering. We will continue to hit them with police actions, together with our colleagues’ prosecutors from DIICOT. Personally, I consider the fight against the underworld to be a perpetual service obligation of the police by all legal means and all possible tactics.”
