Greece and Schengen / Customs issues

Schengen eliminated border controls in between the Schengen nations, so technically there is no internal “border” crossing and control anymore, except for short terms of time as stated in the Schengen treaty when there is a security threat. I am not sure how Greece can get away with their requirement to land first at a port of entry when arriving from another Schengen country.

As one EU official said on TV a while ago, speaking about bullfighting in Spain: “Politics is the art of the possible”

I would think around 95.3% of the interaction between Greece and the EU takes place under the table That’s e.g. how Fraport got themselves positioned to skim off the income stream from most of Greece’s money making airports. It was presented to Greece thus. Obviously Greece should not have got into that position in the first place… but Greece will always be Greece, the sun will always shine there, they will always have a certain standard of living (fresh food etc) even if there is nothing under the mattress, and e.g. Spain was no different in the political and economic conduct when the billions were on offer, with the principal difference being that Spain was a lot bigger and could not be hung out to dry.

Practically speaking, as Petakas says in #8, Greece is presently in no position to operate Schengen and IMHO probably never was, so why did they join? Probably, as a part of the euphoria at the relevant time. Or maybe another under the table deal.

Mooney_Driver wrote:

So the idea that they disregard Schengen is actually not quite true, but they apparently have a rule whereby any vessel or airplane which enters the country must pass customs control. So the violation will be customs. And that tends to be costly. VERY costly. Not only in Greece.

I am amazed after all the discussions on this how many people don‘t understand that the Schengen agreement is on free movement of people only, not goods. Movement of goods is governed by the Dublin agreement. MOST of the Schengen countries also signed the Dublin agreement, but not all. So travel between two Schengen countries may or may not require passing through customs, depending on the countries involved.

For example, there is no passport control between Switzerland and Germany, France, Italy, or Austria because all are part of Schengen. However, Switzerland is not part of Dublin, and requires customs control when entering or leaving the country, regardless of departure/destination.

I think the original Q, specific to Greece, is a fair one.

Greece signed Schengen but does not implement it “for vehicles” which in the absence of land borders which you could walk across simply means it doesn’t implement it.

But Greece is in Schengen as far as the other end of your journey is concerned.

It’s a bizzare situation.

The Swiss situation is thus because Switzerland is not in the EU. Same with Norway. But isn’t Switzerland more complicated anyway, in having some airports which have “exit customs” (LSPV used to)? There is nobody there and you can depart via them. No such thing in Greece; the ports of entry are rigid.

chflyer wrote:

Movement of goods is governed by the Dublin agreement.

Dublin Agreement on Wikipedia redirects to the Dublin Regulation (Dublin II in 2003, Dublin III in 2013), which replaced the Dublin Convention of 1990 (coming into force in 1997). All these are about which is responsible for examining an application of asylum. Switzerland, Denmark and Iceland agreed to apply this regulation, too. The only resistance is from Denmark.

So this is still about movement of people.

It seems to me that movement of goods is determined by the customs union, meaning the EEC/EC/EU.

The specific question, related to Greece, is certainly a fair one. My point is that discussion was drifting off-topic by referring to customs, which has nothing to do with Schengen (free movement of people).

From here

If Schengen was fully implemented in Greece, would that solve all the problems? You’d no longer be forced to use high cost ports of entry.

But are there sufficient other, low cost fields in the right places to make touring Greece and its islands an attractive prospect? Or would it just mean that you’ve a wider choice of very expensive airports?

Greece signed schengen, like they signed everything else to get the Mrs Merkel billions, but they don’t operate it, and get away with it due to the Bismarck principle (the art of the possible etc) and there is no reason this will ever change. Brussels can’t risk Greek departure from the EU, not because of economic reasons but because of the heavy symbolism of the cradle of the European civilisation etc etc.

To make this discussion more positive, we can debate the best ways to fly to and around Greece. Plenty of nice routes.

But are there sufficient other, low cost fields in the right places to make touring Greece and its islands an attractive prospect? Or would it just mean that you’ve a wider choice of very expensive airports?

To answer your question, no there are not. Megara is a place to visit Athens. In the Cyclades, there are a few nice place with domestic airports (Naxos, Milos, Astypalaia) but these are so far from Puglia and Brac, most people will require a fuel stop anyway to make it there. And domestic airports with Avgas don‘t exist either.

So yes, if Greece solved the Schengen thing, not much would change for visiting light GA.