| – Rohee tells security workshop participantsAirports, whether international or municipal, continue to be prime targets for persons who are bent on using the facilities to conduct their nefarious activities.This observation was made by Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee at the opening of the second workshop on airport security at the International Convention Centre, Pattensen, East Coast Demerara.The workshop was organized by the Airport Security Committee in collaboration with the Ministry of Home Affairs, and was attended by representatives from local security and aviation agencies.The aim is to come up with recommendations on how to improve security at the country’s airports.In his feature address to formally open the workshop, the Home Affairs Minister said that since airports are prime targets for the criminally-minded, it is important to put measures in place to minimize the use of airports as means through which criminal activities are conducted.He said that of primary importance is the security of passengers, then the aircraft, luggage, the airport infrastructure itself, and cargo.According to Rohee, linked to the question of airport security is the fight against terrorism, both international and domestic.“Law enforcement agencies, apart from the employees and the management of the administration of an airport, have to be conscious of intended acts of terrorism that could be perpetrated at an airport, thus jeopardising the security of the state and the safety of those who work,holesale NFL Jerseys, as well as those travelling, through an airport,” Rohee said.He explained that although airports cost billions of dollars to construct and maintain, terrorists do not think twice to destroy the infrastructure to achieve their ambitions.This he said sends a serious message internationally with respect to the image of a country.“So the security of the state is inextricably linked to the safety and security measures adopted to maintain the integrity of airports,” Rohee argued.Recently, in many countries, with Guyana being no exception, persons have been increasingly using airports to conduct drug trafficking activities.According to Rohee, this is one of the principle challenges facing airport administrations and law enforcement agencies, who have a duty to ensure the safety of lives and infrastructure in the airport environment.“While we strive for excellence in these areas, we always have to bear in mind that it’s a work in progress. And while we’re seeking to accomplish the objectives of keeping an airport safe and secure, we recognize that in doing that, many challenges that we do not easily predict, surface,” the Home Affairs Minister told the workshop.He commended the police and the Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit for the work that they have been doing to prevent persons from using the airport as a transshipment point for narcotics.He said that airport security, safety and protection are matters that attract the attention of governments, aviation and law enforcement agencies around the world.“There is no single country that I can think of that does not take seriously security arrangements at the airport – whether it’s an international airport or a municipal airport. Countries and states tend to take airport security …very very seriously,” Rohee emphasised.This, he said, is only natural, since airports constitute an important passage through which goods, people and equipment pass on a daily basis.“In some countries…hundreds of aircraft take off and land, sometimes every minute or half of a minute…and airports are like a world in itself, and that is why security there is taken so seriously,”Guyana, he said, is no exception, since although the country is small and developing, it still part of the international community, and has links with certain international agencies that come to Guyana to assess the readiness, and the security arrangements that have been implemented at the airport.Rohee believes that it is because of the recognition and the importance attached to the security of the CJIA, and the Ogle Aerodrome, that government saw it fit to establish an Airport Security Committee four years ago.Having seen the work that has been done by the Airport Security Committee and the CJIA Security Committee, Rohee said that he is convinced that a lot has been accomplished.According to the Home Affairs Minister, the administration is now working with the Ogle Airport Inc. to establish a similar body (Airport Security Committee) as obtains at CJIA.“The authorities that manage and administer that aerodrome have signaled their readiness to work with us to establish such a body and I believe that’s a good sign, because it’s an indication that the local aviation industry is not a poor cousin of the international aviation industry when it comes to security matters,”Rohee cautioned that vulnerability can be increased when persons who work at an airport find themselves working in collusion with persons who are engaged in criminal activity. He asserted that that is why every individual who is accredited to work at an airport is a very important individual.The Home Affairs Minister noted that about nine hundred people who work at the CJIA, out of a population of approximately 700,000, have the responsibility to make sure that the state’s security is not compromised.“The government and the state have vested in every single individual, the responsibility to ensure that the state’s security is not compromised.So that when people, thinking only of themselves, compromise the security of the airport, then they are compromising the security of the state,” Rohee stated.Criminals, he said, become emboldened when they find the security at airports is compromised.“Persons who work at airports are expected to have clean hands, they are expected to be trustworthy and loyal to their professions and their employers, and loyal to the country,” Rohee stressed.Meanwhile, head of the Cheddi Jagan International Airport, Timehri, Ramesh Ghir told the workshop that challenges at airports are evolving, and more people are using ingenious ways to move illegal products through such facilities.He said that the CJIA hopes to come up with a charter to improve aviation security at the facility.According to Ghir, only last week the Civil Aviation Organization completed an audit of the facilities at the CJIA.It is expected that the recommendations from yesterday’s workshop will be added to those that were made last year, some of which have already been implemented. |
