The EGTC Euregio Senza Confini has won the 2026 “Building Europe across borders” award for projects run by European Groupings of Territorial Cooperation.
The winning project focuses on emergency calls in the border area between Friuli Venezia Giulia in Italy and Carinthia in Austria, where people dialling 112 — Europe’s emergency number — did not always reach the correct operations centre until 2024, the European Committee of the Regions (CoR) announced.
Some calls were accidentally routed to the wrong country because of unintentional mobile phone roaming near the border, delaying rescue operations.
An updated Civil Protection Agreement was signed in April 2025 by the Province of Carinthia and the Italian regions of Friuli Venezia Giulia and Veneto under the EGTC.
The arrangement enabled a direct and automated system for routing calls between the 112 centre in Friuli Venezia Giulia and centres in Carinthia, the CoR said.
It added 75 calls were handled in the first year, supported by a 24-hour interpreting service covering 17 languages. The agreement will run until 2035.
Honorary mention for Franco-Spanish border employment project
An honorary mention went to the EGTC Eurorégion Nouvelle Aquitaine - Euskadi - Navarre on the French-Spanish border for its “Empleo Egunak” project for cross-border workers and businesses, the CoR said.
The initiative is part of the Interreg POCTEFA LANEAN project and includes a one-stop shop, a cross-border coordination forum for public administrations, and a cross-border employment forum.
The award ceremony took place during the two-day annual meeting of the European Cross-Border Platform, co-organised by the European Committee of the Regions and CESCI.
The event also marked 20 years since the EU rules creating EGTCs came into force, the organisation added. EGTCs are legal structures that allow public bodies from different countries to set up a joint entity to cooperate across borders under EU law.
