Above: Aruba Prime Minister Mike Eman at the official opening (Photo: PMA)

By the Caribbean Journal staff

Aruba has officially opened a new pre-clearance facility for private planes.

The facility, which is located at the Universal Aviation terminal, provides immigration and customs inspection for private planes heading to the United States from Aruba.

Dylan di Fransisci, director of pre-clearance for US Customs and Border Protection, said the facility was an “important extension” to the existing pre-clearance facility at Aruba’s Reina Beatrix International Airport.

“We have worked hard on insuring that this facility complies with the standard of CBP to support our mission of national security and to so extend our frontiers further,” Fransisci said.

Aruba is one of just 16 US customs pre-clearance locations in the world, and one of just two in the Caribbean, along with the Bahamas.