Washington — U.S. Customs and Border Protection announced today that it has reached its fiscal year 2007 goal of initiating Container Security Initiative operations at 58 oversees ports to target and pre-screen maritime cargo containers destined for U.S. ports.

CSI addresses the threat to border security and global trade posed by the potential for terrorist use of a maritime container to deliver a weapon. CSI proposes a security regime to ensure all containers that pose a potential risk for terrorism areentified and inspected at foreign ports before they are placed on vessels destined for the United States.

"We are committed to using high-tech equipment and a smarter, more secure container to safeguard the supply chain, but realize that cooperation from our friends around the globe is our most potent weapon," said W. Ralph Basham.

CBP’s Container Security Initiative, launched months after the terrorist attacks of 2001, is a cooperative effort with host country governments toentify and screen high-risk shipments before they leave participating ports. More than 85 percent of all cargo containers destined for U.S. shores originate in or are transshipped through 58 CSI ports in North, South and Central America, Europe, Asia, Africa and the Middle East. The initiative:

• Identifies high-risk containers. CBP uses automated targeting tools to entify containers that pose a potential risk for terrorism, based on advance information and strategic intelligence.
• Prescreen and evaluate containers before they are shipped. Containers are screened as early in the supply chain as possible, generally at the port of departure.
• Employs technology to prescreen high-risk containers to ensure that screening can be done rapidly without slowing down the movement of trade. This technology includes large-scale X-ray and gamma ray machines and radiation detection devices.

Under its Megaports Initiative, the Department of Energy is providing specialized equipment to the ports capable of indicating the presence of special nuclear and other radioactive materials in containerized cargo, thereby enhancing CBP’s capability to deter, detect and interdict illicit shipments of special nuclear and other radioactive materials at its ports. Around the world, the Megaports Initiative is currently operational in eight ports; operational testing is underway in four additional ports; and another 12 ports in Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, Europe and the Middle East are scheduled to be operational in 2008.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection is the unified border agency within the Department of Homeland Security charged with the management, control and protection of the nation’s borders at and between the official ports of entry. CBP is charged with keeping terrorists and terrorist weapons out of the country while enforcing hundreds of U.S. laws.

Contacts For This News Release