The signing of the third amendment to the MOSAR agreement on September 18th, 2024 marks a new milestone in cross-border healthcare cooperation between Moselle and Saarland.
On Monday September 16th, Germany reintroduced border controls for six months to combat illegal immigration, drawing criticism from within the European Union (EU) for failing to consult with other EU countries. After the border controls already in place with Poland, the Czech Republic, Austria and Switzerland, Germany has now reintroduced border controls with France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Belgium and Denmark.
On September 1st, the Savoy Department and the Aosta Valley organized the first Alpine Festival at the Little St Bernard Pass.
"Easy Border" is a simple, user-friendly navigator that guides you to the right European Commission service for your cross-border needs. Whether you need help overcoming an obstacle or are looking for information, Easy Border has you covered. This intuitive tool supports individuals and both public and private organisations across the European Union, as well as Switzerland, Norway, Liechtenstein, and Iceland.
The creation of a new online platform, called StatRhena, was announced by the Upper Rhine Interreg program following its monitoring committee meeting on July 9th, 2024.
On August 27th, 2024, Franck Leroy, President of the Grand Est Region, and Winfried Hermann, Baden-Württemberg's Minister of Transport, unveiled the first France-Germany Régiolis cross-border train (TFA).
In a meeting in Nyon on July 2nd, 2024, the Assembly of the Local cross-border cooperation group (GLCT) of Greater Geneva laid the foundations for its “Cross-border territorial vision for 2050”.
Following the European elections, the MOT would like to pay special tribute to the work of MEP Anne Sander, MOT vice-president since 2015, whose mandate has unfortunately not been renewed.
On June 20th, 2024, the regulation "on a Union Code on the rules governing the movement of persons across borders" - the new "Schengen Code" - was published in the EU's Official Journal.
On June 19th, the MOT was invited to speak at the Strasbourg-Ortenau Eurodistrict Council, chaired by Jeanne Barseghian, Mayor of Strasbourg.
At the "Reinforcing Cross-Border Governance for Development" event held on June 19th and 20th, the European Commission and the OECD presented a new tool designed to strengthen governance in the cross-border regions of the European Union.
The study on "Strengthening the resilience of EU border regions: Mapping risks & crisis management tools and identifying gaps" has just been published by the European Commission (DG REGIO and DG ECHO).
On June 17th, the MOT and the Dunkirk Urban Community co-organized a "Journée Trans-Mer du Nord" (Trans-North Sea Day) to launch a forward-looking reflection process, initially internal to the Dunkirk region, on cooperation with neighboring England.
On June 5th, 2024, a new meeting of the MOT network's "cross-border governance" working group was held, focusing on the results of the "cross-border living areas" experiment. This experiment was conducted for over a year by the MOT with the support of 17 network partners on 5 pilot sites on the French borders, and resulted in a final report available on the MOT website.
On July 21st, 2023, France and Germany signed an agreement on the development of cross-border apprenticeships. This "major bilateral cooperation project" involves establishing a secure legal framework to enable apprentices from both countries to complete the practical or theoretical part of their training in the neighboring country.
On June 11th, 2024, the new national sea and coastal strategy (SNML) for the period 2024-2030 was adopted. The strategy aims to coordinate public policies relating to the sea and coast, and is structured around 18 objectives. The four main priorities are carbon neutrality, biodiversity protection, social equity and the competitiveness of a sustainable blue economy.
Following the floods in inland Flanders in November 2023 and January 2024, which necessitated the activation of the "MAGETEAUX" plan*, the President of the French Republic entrusted François Decoster, Mayor of Saint-Omer, with a mission to analyze our neighbors' flood prevention and management practices and policies.
The POCTEFA program has launched a questionnaire for local residents to identify the border obstacles that affect their daily lives.
The first pilot committee of the SA-URG (Support Sanitaire opérationnel de réponse à l'Urgence transpyrénéenne) project, financed by the European POCTEFA program, was held on June 13th and 14th, 2024 in Bayonne.
To mark its fifteenth anniversary, the Lille-Kortrijk-Tournai Eurometropolis has interviewed all its stakeholders to retrace the history of the EGTC and outline its future horizons: "elected representatives, partners, technicians, members of civil society... they have all responded to this invitation to look back at the history of the Eurometropolis". The first three episodes are available on the Eurometropolis’s YouTube channel.
On April 23rd, 2024, CESER Grand Est brought together cross-border civil society at a meeting devoted to cross-border living areas. The role of civil society in European policies was debated. Solutions proposed included the creation of a “legal base” to facilitate cross-border cooperation in healthcare, and the simplification of administrative procedures.
"At a time of ecological and financial crisis, territories must support the development of ambitious public policies to decarbonize mobility, despite insufficient financial capacity to meet demand that is complex and costly to satisfy. How, then, can supply and demand for mobility be reconciled?"
For over a year, the MOT has been conducting an experiment on “cross-border living areas”, supported by seventeen partners in five pilot sites. You can now consult the final report and download our infographic of the study's key takeaways. Don't forget to register for our webinar on June 5th!
To influence the debate on the future of EU policies after 2027, the European Committee of the Regions (CoR) organized a conference on May 14th in Croatia, in cooperation with the INTERACT program, to draw the attention of decision-makers to the new challenges facing regions and cities, and to discuss the role of European Territorial Cooperation (ETC) in helping to meet these challenges.
A conference entitled “The cross-border living area: a laboratory for European integration between Italy and France” was held in Rome on April 18th, 2024. It brought together researchers, elected representatives and technicians from French and Italian border territories, both land and sea, as well as national administrations. The day of reflection was jointly organized by CERDACFF (DITER), Université Nice Côte d'Azur, and CNR/ ISSIRFA.
