The border agencies in Fiji are currently meeting to formulate a legal binding framework that allows them to work together.

At the opening of the workshop at Novotel Lami, Permanent Secretary for Defence and National Security Osea Cawaru said that the past two border workshops have highlighted the need to re-look at the legal framework that will integrate different agencies’ independent procedures into one.

He stressed that border security challenges and threats are increasingly interrelated and one can no longer imagine an isolated crisis in one region that does not impact the security enforcers of another region.

Cawaru says external factors such as easy access to new technologies such as cyber as well as the use of social media know no border, no nationality and no religion.

Cawaru adds that these threats can span over peacetime, crisis or conflict and that security management requires the participation of many enforcers and organizations to work together.

He says with the current inadequacies in the system to cope with evolving challenges, it highlights the importance of building relationships, common understanding and confidence between the various organizations.