Brussels, 03/12/2002 (Agence Europe) - Last week, the Danish Presidency presented to the Justice and Home Affairs Council a progress report on the EU external borders management plan. The report describes 17 joint operations that are to be conducted in coming weeks and months. For example: the project for the management of maritime borders, headed by Spain, Greece, the United Kingdom and Italy, brings together four control projects for the Mediterranean (Canary Islands, fight against trade in people, the eastern Mediterranean and Turkey), to which are to be added a Norwegian project against illegal immigration and cross-border crime in the North Sea. The first two projects are to be carried out at the end of the year, the third in December and the last two early 2003. The other pilot projects will cover the control of airports (March 2003), the creation of a cooperation centre for land borders the time of a trial operation (end 2002, then early 2003), and the common repatriation of illegal migrants, in the aim of developing a protocol for European charter flights, etc. At the Council, the SCIFA+ working group is responsible for following up these projects. The group is composed of the SCIFA working group (Strategic Committee for Immigration, Frontiers and Asylum) as well as officials from the border control services.