Slovenian Interior Minister Bostjan Poklukar has mentioned the possibility of sending Frontex (European Border and Coast Guard Agency) to the Croatian-Bosnian border to prevent illegal migration, his ministry said on Thursday.

Poklukar met with Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini on the fringes of a meeting of EU interior ministers and they discussed migrations and the situation in the Western Balkans, the Slovenian Interior Ministry said.

The two ministers agreed that the problem is not the Slovenian-Italian border but the external EU border which should be protected even better, the ministry said. They expressed willingness to help Croatia if it assesses that it needs help, and Poklukar mentioned the possibility of sending Frontex to the Croatian-Bosnian border, it added.

Poklukar told Salvini that closing the Slovenian-Italian border because of illegal migration was unnecessary and that the situation on the border did not call for it. Any restriction of the border regime on the border would interfere with the everyday life of people living along the border, the ministry said, adding that border closures in history had negative consequences.