Our mandate on migration

Migration is a broad topic that cuts across several of the OSCE’s dimensions and activity areas. The Helsinki Final Act 1975 first acknowledged migration and the situations of migrants, by dedicating a chapter on the “Economic and social aspects of migrant labour”.

A great number of decisions and documents following the Helsinki Final Act further enlarged the OSCE’s mandate on migration, specifying tasks that relate, among other issues, to the human rights and the economic situation of migrants. This includes the 1990 Document of the Copenhagen Meeting of the Conference on the Human Dimension of the CSCECSCE
Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe, the Charter of Paris for a New Europe from the same year, the 1994 Concluding Document of Budapest, the Lisbon Document from 1996 and the Istanbul Document from 1999, as well as two Ministerial Council decisions—taken in Maastricht in 2003 and Sofia in 2004—on tolerance and non-discrimination. A compilation, put together in 2005, details the Organization’s commitments on the issue of migration.

Some decisions, declarations and documents provide specific guidance regarding the commitments and tasks of the OSCE and its participating States in the realm of migration-related questions. Among them is the Concluding Document of Vienna, Third Follow-up Meeting, 1989, which clearly states that the “participating States will respect fully the right of everyone […] to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each State, and […] to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country”.

At the Ministerial Council in Brussels in 2006, the OSCE States agreed on a Ministerial Statement on the issue of migration, which not only expressed support for the work carried out on migration and integration in countries of origin, destination and transit of migrants, but also mandated the OSCE to continue its work, among other issues, on the potential contribution of migration to sustainable development and co-development; addressing forced migration while respecting relevant international legal obligations; and combating illegal migration as well as trafficking in human beings and the exploitation, discrimination, abuse and manifestation of racism directed towards migrants.

At the Ministerial Council in Athens in 2009, the States focused directly on the linkages among migration, economic co-operation and development. They underscored the importance of mainstreaming migration policies into economic, social, environmental, development and security strategies; and called for an “improved policy coherence between migration and economic, social, environmental and security
policies”; and emphasized the need for “measures to minimize negative impacts of the global financial and economic crisis on migrants by intensifying economic co-operation, creating attractive conditions for investment and business development and facilitating the flow of remittances”.