Jean-François Tallec, General Secretary for Maritime affairs and Lead Partner of BLUEMASSMED project, left his position in December 2011. We thank him for his fruitful collaboration and wish him a lot of success in his next position.
The Bluemassmed project is an innovative initiative from the European Commission aiming at increasing the cooperation for maritime surveillance in the Mediterranean Sea and its Atlantic Approaches.
France, Greece, Italy, Malta, Portugal and Spain have decided to cooperate on this specific project to strengthen their common actions against illicit trafficking, illegal immigration and environmental pollution. It will also permit to reinforced the Search and Rescue efforts in the area.
This pilot project granted by the European Commission and co-funded by 6 Member States countries (France, Greece, Italy, Malta, Portugal and Spain) is the first state-centred action to integrate such an important field between Member States countries.
Context
The sea has always been regarded as a space of liberty and freedom. For these reasons sea trades and communications flourished and sustained the development of our civilization and countries. However at sea there are no physical borders to prevent illegal or criminal activities.
Further it represents also a vast area to monitor and control in order to protect the environment and natural resources, ensure safety and security of navigation, assist people in distress and most of all to ensure the undisrupted flow of goods necessary for the well being of the European population and third nations development.
