To reduce queues at the Belarusian-Lithuanian border, customs officer shifts have been reinforced

August 19, Minsk /Lilia Krapivina - BELTA/. Customs shifts have been reinforced at the "Kotlovka" and "Benyakoni" border crossing points on the Belarusian-Lithuanian border to reduce queues. This was announced today to journalists by Vladimir Orlovsky, Head of the Customs Control Organization Department of the State Customs Committee of Belarus, commenting on the increased cargo traffic and queues on the Belarusian-Lithuanian border section.

Queues at the border arose because road surface repair works began on August 16 at the "Medininkai" (Lithuania) road border crossing point. For the duration of the repair works, the adjacent border crossing point on the Belarusian side, "Kamenny Log," was closed to traffic. Its operation has been temporarily suspended. Vehicles have been rerouted to other border crossing points on the Lithuanian-Belarusian border.

"The increased cargo traffic significantly exceeded the throughput capacity of these border crossing points, which led to the creation of queues. As of 13:00 on August 19, the queue at the "Kotlovka" border crossing point for entry consisted of 350 cargo vehicles, and for exit - 800. At the "Benyakoni" border crossing point, the queue for exit is 450 vehicles, and at the "Privalka" border crossing point - 250 vehicles for exit," noted Vladimir Orlovsky.

To reduce waiting times in queues, the State Customs Committee of Belarus strongly recommends that cargo carriers and forwarders use the border crossing points on the Belarusian-Polish section of the border - "Kozlovichi," "Bruzgi-2," "Berestovitsa" - when transporting cargo vehicles to EU countries.

All employees of the "Kamenny Log" customs post have been redistributed among other border crossing points. The shifts at the "Kotlovka" and "Benyakoni" border crossing points have been reinforced by officials from the "Kamenny Log" post.

The road repair in Medininkai will last until 7 a.m. on August 23. "This is a planned repair, the Lithuanian side notified about it 2 months before the start of work," said Vladimir Orlovsky. He also noted that the flow of freight vehicles remains at approximately the same level throughout the year. A slight decrease in flow is observed at the beginning of the calendar year. However, such repair work is problematic to carry out in winter, so the summer period was chosen. "If we take the summer months, there is no significant discrepancy in freight traffic," explained the representative of the State Customs Committee. -0-