Lisbon, April 15, 2025 (Lusa) - Portugal's government said on Tuesday that the country will be able to apply the rules of the European Union's Entry/Exit System (EES) from October, meeting a commitment made to its partners and its own population. "This is an investment of twenty-four million euros that will transform our Portuguese borders into more secure ones," said the cabinet office minister, António Leitão Amaro, on a visit to Lisbon airport accompanied by the minister of internal administration, Margarida Blasco. "When a human being comes in, if he's Senhor João, the next time he comes in he has to be Senhor João, because if he tries to be Senhor João [but is not] he won't come in," the minister explained, stressing that Portugal “is now a much stronger control, much more robust and therefore more trusted" by its own people and partners. "When we took office, the programme was completely unimplemented" by the previous, Socialist government, the minister stressed, adding that Portugal had to step up because it was “at risk of being suspended from full Schengen membership.” The SES has already been tested in Portugal and it has always passed, so the country is in a position to enter the European system from October, the minister said. "Portugal has a lot of passengers from outside the Schengen area: from the United Kingdom, the United States of America, South America and Asia [and] it's going to be a very demanding process from October onwards,” he emphasised. For her part, the minister of internal administration emphasised the effort made to train up members of the PSP police force to apply this new model, which involves collecting biometric data from all visitors in a database shared with European partners. "What we've been focusing on, on the part of the Ministry of Internal Administration, is a strong component of training the police who are at the borders," so that Portugal “continues to be a safe country,” she said. The new EES was presented to the government by officials from Portugal's Internal Security System (SSI) and the PSP. PJA/ARO // ARO. Lusa