Progress in Border Management Sector and Approximation to EU Standards: Interagency Working Group meeting chaired by Olha Stefanishyna took place

On 7 May 2025, a meeting of the Interagency Working Group (hereinafter referred to as the IWG) on the coordination of integrated state border management was held under the chairmanship of Olha Stefanishyna, Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration and Minister of Justice of Ukraine.

"Integrated state border management is one of the strategic directions of State's development. That is why our key task is to build a national model of state border management in line with the European model. This includes both the improvement of our institutional capacities, as well as the modernisation of infrastructure and procedures. Cooperation with the EU and approximation to the best standards and practices in this area is not just a technical task - it is a guarantee of the security of our State, our citizens, and the future of the European space,’ Olha Stefanishyna said opening the meeting.

According to the Deputy Prime Minister, Ukraine has already analysed the state of integrated border management and started to develop an updated Strategy in this area. At the same time, she stressed the need to enhance the protection of personal data processing as a key element of ensuring the human right to privacy and information security.

Olha Stefanishyna also stressed the importance of close interagency cooperation for effective information exchange, harmonisation of cyber defence standards and prompt response to potential threats. She called on the responsible authorities to step up their efforts in this area and work to improve the mechanisms of interaction.

During the meeting, Volodymyr Nikiforenko, First Deputy Head of the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine, reported on the results of the analysis of the state of integrated border management.

Based on the results of the security environment analysis, the participants identified current and potential threats, as well as assessed the capacities and readiness of Ukraine's national actors to implement the 15 European components of integrated border management.

As part of the meeting, the Working Group members heard a report by Andrii Vikhtiuk, Director of the Department of Work Organisation, Planning and Control of the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine, on the status of implementation of the Action Plan for the Implementation of the Integrated Border Management Strategy in 2024.

In his report, the Director of the Department said that since 2023, 24 measures of the Plan had been implemented, with 132 indicators fully achieved.

In particular, Ukraine took part in a joint operation with FRONTEX TERRA to combat illegal migration and smuggling (in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia) and the Global Chain to combat human trafficking.

Andrii Viktiuk noted that the tasks for achieving 136 indicators were currently underway. Among the key objectives are preparations for signing the FRONTEX Status Agreement and regulatory regulation of the use of EU databases.

The meeting participants also heard a report from Mykola Lushchyk, Head of the Communications and Information Systems Department of the State Border Guard Department - Head of Communications of the State Border Guard Service Administration, and Ihor Smirnov, Deputy Director of the Department for Digital Development, Digital Transformation and Digitalisation of the State Customs Service of Ukraine, on the state of functioning, data exchange and protection of departmental information and communication systems.

The offline meeting was attended by, among others, Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Oleksii Serhiiev, First Deputy Head of the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine Volodymyr Nikiforenko, and Deputy Head of the State Customs Service of Ukraine Vladyslav Suvorov.

International partners also joined the meeting: Barbara Rotovnik, Sector Manager on Migration and Integrated Border Management, EU Delegation to Ukraine, Jesse Seppala, expert in the field of integrated border management, Pawel Śliwiński, Acting Head of the Pre-Accession Cooperation Sector, and FRONTEX Senior International Cooperation Officer - Regional Coordinator Marcin Daniszewski, Juergen Illig, EUAM Head of IBM Unit, and Senior Advisor on Integrated Border Management and Customs Josef Oreski of the European Union Advisory Mission EUAM, Border and Migration Management Project Manager at the International Organization for Migration in Ukraine (IOM) Roman Horbovyi and Team Leader of the “Border Management in Ukraine – Resilience” of the International Centre for Migration Policy Development of the International Centre for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD) Vyacheslav Toporov.