Schily Pushes Digital Communication System

Interior Minister Otto Schily is pressing on in the fight between the central government and the federal states around financing a new modern digital communications system for German intelligence and police services, as well as fire departments and security agencies. To realize plans for substituting the aging analogue radio, Schily invited his colleagues, the interior ministers of all 16 states, to a special conference where he intends to suggest that the financing of the project be split in central government and federal state components. The central government would then take over the costs for equipping the Federal Border Guard with modern communication means. Amounting to €800 million, these costs would cover more than 25 percent of the whole project and present a much bigger concession on part of the central government than the originally promised 8.5 percent.