OREANDA-NEWS. April 8, 2011. Belarus and the European Union should aspire to establish visa free regime, borders should unite our countries but not separate them, Chairman of the State Border Committee of Belarus Igor Rachkovsky told an online conference hosted by the National State TV and Radio Company website.

“There were and will be frontier guards… and there are frontier guards at the internal borders of the European Union, but they are not seen, there is no passport control for travelers. Thus the liberalization of borders is to take place by all means. We should strive for visa free regime. Given modern equipment which frontier guards have visa issue is a formality. If a person is included in the travel ban list of any country he will be unable to enter this country. And it does not matter if he has a visa or not. The same situation is here,” Igor Rachkovsky said. According to him, “today’s visa is a way to replenish budgets of diplomatic missions of any country.”

When speaking about long lines at the borders with the EU member states, Igor Rachkovsky said that frontier guards only will not solve the problem. According to him, a number of objective and subjective reasons may lead to the creation of lines. First, starting from 1 July new customs tariffs on automobiles will come into force. A lot of people went to Europe in order to buy a car thus the number of cars increased considerably. Second, the prices on fuel are different in Belarus and the European Union. “We understand those people who come to Belarus in order to buy fuel,” Igor Rachkovsky said. The third problem is connected with food and other products.

Igor Rachkovsky cited the Kamenny Log checkpoint as an example. The number of people crossing the borders increased by 6.5% and the number of vehicles went up 10.3%. On average, the number of people at the Belarus-Lithuania border increased by 21% and the number of vehicles went up 16%.

“They say cutting the knot is the best way to solve problems. It means the introduction of new customs tariffs, the increase in fuel prices in Belarus, etc. But who will suffer then? The State Border Committee will consider any interesting ideas,” Igor Rachkovsky said.

The State Border Committee is ready to recruit more frontier guards, however, the adjacent countries will not do the same as they have much stricter norms regarding the number of employees at the checkpoints. The economic crisis also affected the budgets of border committees of the adjacent countries. The Baltic countries and Poland reduce the number of frontier guards. “However, practically every day we come in contact with our counterparts to solve the problem of lines,” Igor Rachkovsky noted.

He urged people to post information regarding the lines on the Belarusian side of the border on the State Border Committee website. “The information on the website does not give a clear picture of the satiation with the lines. But we cannot cross the border and have to ask people. Thus the information is not always accurate. We monitor the situation every three hours and update the information,” Igor Rachkovsky concluded.