Personnel from the Cyprus Navy, maritime police and Egypt’s Border Guard Corps have graduated from two advanced courses on Visit-Board-Search-Seizure (VBSS) tactics and CBRN (Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear) threat response at the US-funded CYCLOPS training facility in Larnaca. The week-long programmes are part of a trilateral security agenda that underpins safer shipping lanes in the Eastern Mediterranean. For the global-mobility sector, tighter maritime security directly affects ferry services, cruise itineraries and the movement of offshore energy crews between Limassol, Alexandria and Port Said. Somali-style boarding incidents are rare in the region, but insurers have raised premiums after recent drone attacks on merchant vessels transiting the Suez approaches. By standardising VBSS procedures, Cyprus and Egypt aim to speed up inspections of suspicious ships without detaining compliant commercial traffic—a boon for logistics firms shipping household goods and project cargo to expatriate compounds. The CBRN module, meanwhile, equips port-security teams to detect smuggled nuclear or biological materials that could threaten densely populated coastal cities. Participants practised using handheld spectrometers and protective gear in simulated container-yard scenarios, with technical instruction provided by US Coast Guard advisors. The training culminated in a live-fire boarding exercise aboard the Cypriot patrol vessel Ioannides. Justice Minister Costas Fytiris, who attended the graduation ceremony, said the courses “show how practical cooperation raises the security baseline for all legitimate maritime actors—including tourism and shipping.” Further iterations are planned for 2027 and will expand to include Jordan and Greece.
Source: Cyprus Inform
