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President Ilves: Every bridge has two ends

29.05.2007

“The border must hold. Must hold back those who have evil plans. For others the border should be a friendly gate, which says, “Welcome to Estonia! Welcome to Europe!”,” said President Toomas Hendrik Ilves today at the official inauguration of the Narva 2 checkpoint.

During two days, the Estonian Head of State has been visiting the guard posts and checkpoints on the eastern border, starting from Luhamaa yesterday and ending today in Narva.

“The Narva 2 border checkpoint is such a gateway between the European Union and Russia, which will hopefully be characterized next year on the Estonian side by the word Schengen. Schengen means that Narva will become a gateway to all of Europe, without any additional obstacles,” said the Head of State. “This is a great responsibility for Estonia and I am sure that you, the Estonian border guards, will cope splendidly with this responsibility.”

Initially, the Narva 2 border checkpoint is intended only for border crossings by the residents of Narva and Ivangorod, but in the future, Estonia hopes to make this into an ordinary international checkpoint.

“The better neighbors know each other and the more they know about each other, the better they understand each other,” declared President Ilves and recalled an English-language adage, “Good fences make good neighbors”.

“Therefore, please view the opening of Narva 2 as the building of bridge gateway by Estonia. However, each bridge always has two ends,” acknowledged the Head of State. The President later commented to the journalists that Ivangorod is Russia’s window to Europe.

Office of the President
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