Saudi government moves forward with border fence plans

At least they don’t have to wait for Congress to approve. Nervous about terrorism and drug smuggling (but not so much Mexican immigrants) Saudi Arabia is moving ahead with a $12 billion massive border protection plan along the kingdom’s northeastern front with Iraq that will include electronic sensors, military outposts, and physical barriers. With the security situaion in Iraq crumbling, Saudi officials are worried about Sunni extremists of the al Qaeda variety, as well as dissident Shiites, crossing the border to stir up trouble. Since 2004, the government has spent $1.8 billion on border surveillance projects, but it was designed to keep Saudis out of Iraq rather than the other way around.

The Saudi government is notoriously tight-lipped, but details of the plan emerged this month in the Middle East Economic Digest (MEED). According to MEED, the security barrier will include a double fence with 135 electronically controlled gates, fence-mounted movement detection sensors, buried radio detection sensors, and concertina razor wire. Other reports suggested ultraviolet cameras would also be used, and it remains unclear whether the project invisions a fence that covers the entire Saudi Arabia-Iraq border, or just likely crossing points. Biometrics may also eventually play a role. We reported earlier this year that the kingdom is amassing a fingerprint database of all citizens and foreigners that enter the kingdom and hopes to eventually develop an Automated Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS) at all air, sea and land ports and other border crossings

Contracts for the border project have not been awarded, and work will not begin until 2008 at the earliest. When it does, it is expected to take at least five years to complete.

-read more in Jim Krane’s AP report