05 December 2001
U.S. Coast Guard Wants to Push Maritime Border Controls Off Shore
(Sees stopping weapons of mass destruction as priority) (918)
By Andrzej Zwaniecki
Washington File Staff Writer
Washington -- The U.S. Coast Guard would like to push off shore as
many border control activities as possible, an agency official says.
Captain Tony Regalbuto, chief of the agency's office of waterways
management policy and planning, said that after the September 11
terrorist attacks, "we would prefer to intercept illegitimate people
and cargo on the high seas."
"Once they get into a U.S. port, it might be too late to act," he
said.
But Regalbuto said in a December 3 interview that this approach
requires international cooperation.
"So we are working with the International Maritime Organization [IMO]
trying to ensure that other countries keep the proper level of
security in their ports," he said.
IMO is a United Nations agency dealing with issues related to maritime
transportation.
Regalbuto said that intercepting terrorist threats before potential
perpetrators enter the United States entails better and more accurate
information about the vessel, including who owns and operates it, well
in advance of the ship's arrival to a U.S. seaport.
The U.S. Coast Guard requires notification about a ship, its cargo and
crews 96 hours in advance of its arrival. In the future, the vessels'
owners and operators should be able to file one electronic report that
meets the needs of all federal agencies, Regalbuto said.
He emphasized that ship ownership information is particularly
important.
"Osama Bin Laden or other terrorists may be operating some merchant
ships so we have to have ability to see who actually owns or operates
ships," Regalbuto said.
Since September 11, he said, the U.S. Coast Guard has been trying to
identify cargo that can be used as a weapon of mass destruction so
that ships carrying such cargo can be inspected before they enter U.S.
ports.
In some ports, Regalbuto said, the Coast Guard has been experimenting
with sea marshals, highly trained agency officers who escort such
high-risk ships to the pier.
One of the major security challenges for both the U.S. Coast Guard and
the U.S. Customs Service is freight containers, Regalbuto said. About
17 million containers per year enter the United States through
seaports, and only 2 percent are inspected by Customs, according to
press reports.
"This is an opportunity for criminal activities; terrorists can use
containers to ship weapons of mass destruction or people," Regalbuto
said.
One recent proposal to prevent terrorist activity involves the use of
electronic seals for container shipments so that both the federal
agencies and people engaged in trade would know if the shipment was
opened or tampered with after leaving an overseas facility.
Moreover, the U.S. Customs Service announced that it is planning to
install additional inspection equipment and looking for new technology
to better detect weapons of mass destruction.
Shifting to passenger traffic, Regalbuto said that since 1986 cruise
lines have operated with high security standards, requiring a security
officer on board of each cruise ship and security training for all
crew members.
They have introduced even stricter security procedures, he said, after
September 11. The new measures include screening of all passenger
baggage, carry-on luggage, ship stores, and cargo as well as higher
levels of screening of passenger identification.
But Regalbuto said that some security positions within cruise lines
may still not suffice for the current heightened level of security and
might need to be modeled after the new aviation transportation
industry security regime.
"We are considering recommending to the secretary of transportation
that he looks at federalizing screening positions at cruise terminals
as well," he said.
Considering that 95 percent of foreign goods enter the United States
through seaports, Regalbuto said, the need to balance security and
trade concerns is even more challenging than ensuring cruise passenger
security.
The U.S. Customs Service has recently proposed allowing importers to
move their goods more quickly across U.S. borders in exchange for
establishing a secure shipping network all the way from a
manufacturing facility overseas to a U.S. port.
The U.S. Coast Guard wants to achieve similar goals by introducing a
risk-based management of ship and cargo inspections, he said. Ships
arriving from overseas ports with a sufficient level of security would
be subject to only random inspections while those coming from other,
less secure destinations would be inspected more thoroughly, Regalbuto
said.
"Based on historic data, we may even prevent from entering our ports
vessels from countries with a track record of especially poor
security," Regalbuto said.
The agency has also started doing a port vulnerability assessment and
asked Coast Guard captains of the ports to identify "high-risk,
high-vulnerability, high-consequence critical infrastructure," he
said.
With help from the owners and operators of the facilities and local,
state and federal law enforcement agencies, "we want to prevent
critical infrastructure such as nuclear power plants or refineries
located near waterways or ports from being attacked," Regalbuto said.
Regalbuto said that protecting U.S. ports and waterways against
terrorists should not be incompatible with drug enforcement, although
the agency's efforts in the latter area were reduced by about 75
percent following September 11. He said that the agency has actually
made a connection between drug enforcement and ability to detect
terrorist activities because of the proven links between the two.
"So we put together strategies that require a multi-layer approach
while waiting for additional resources," Regalbuto said.
(The Washington File is a product of the Office of International
Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site:
http://usinfo.state.gov)
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