85% of the State's ports of general interest, 36 ports, have Protection Plans today.
Throughout 2013 and 2014, the Ministry of Public Works, State Ports Authority, Port Authorities, regional port management bodies, and the Ministry of the Interior made a significant effort to advance the implementation of Directive 65/2005, greatly accelerating the approval process for all plans. Currently, of the 67 ports affected by the regulations—43 of general interest and 24 under regional management—50 have their corresponding Protection Plans approved, leaving 17 pending. Of these, 7 are ports of general interest and the remaining 10 are ports under regional jurisdiction.
The current status of pending files allows us to affirm that the Protection Plans for all Spanish ports will be approved in the coming months, most of them in 2014, as has been proposed to the European Commission, and all of them will certainly be operational in the first half of 2015.
Port Security Plans, which are prepared by the Port Authorities and approved by the Ministry of the Interior under Royal Decree 1617/2007, establish measures for the improvement of port and maritime transport security, incorporating Directive 2005/65/EC on improving port security into Spanish law.
These Port Security Plans incorporate the Security Plans for Port Facilities located within their boundaries. The latter have been in place since 2004 and are drawn up pursuant to Regulation (EC) 725/2004 on the enhancement of the security of ships and port facilities, which regulates the ISPS Code (International Ship and Port Facility Security Code) at the European level, adopted by the IMO in December 2002.
