A groundbreaking ceremony for the U.S.-funded Maritime Fusion Center was held on Georgia’s Black Sea coast in the region of Guria on April 2.
  
Maritime Fusion Center will be “a unique facility on the Black Sea designed to fight against illicit traffic and crime through interagency cooperation,” the U.S. embassy in Tbilisi said

It said that USD 1.2 million was allocated through the Department of State’s Export Control and related Border Security program, for the Maritime Fusion Center, which aims at enhancing “safety and security of Georgia as a transit country.”

U.S. ambassador Richard Norland and Interior Minister Irakli Garibashvili, who inaugurated the construction of the Maritime Fusion Center, also participated on the same day in a ribbon cutting ceremony of Vessel Repair Facility on the Georgian coast guard base in port town of Poti.

USD 6 million worth facility was also funded through the Export Control and related Border Security program and its construction was launched in 2011.