The GNR has promised to be more "attentive" to drivers using a mobile phone while driving.
The operation, "Smartphone, Smartdrive" runs across the country for the rest of this week and aims to inform drivers on the effects of phone use when behind the wheel.
The second phase involves an intensification of roadside inspections to detect drivers using phones and fining them.
The GNR has revealed World Health Organisation figures from the 'Global Status Report on Road Safety 2015' in which Portugal sets an appalling example of mobile phone use when driving.
According to the report, within Europe the Portuguese are the most likely to use the phone while driving, with 59% of motorists regularly doing so.
The WHO report emphasised that the use of a mobile phone while driving creates various types of distraction. Use covers answering and making calls, reading and writing text messages, and sodding around on Facebook and Twitter.
The GNR warns that using phone for whatever reason while driving, "limits the capabilities of the driver, causing distraction and distracts the mind while driving."
For the sake of a few euros spent on an ear piece for hands free use, Portugal’s roads are made more dangerous by this needless occupation that 6 in 10 drivers insist on continuing.
