News and press releases

On 13 June, the OSCE Transnational Threats Department organized a regional co-ordination meeting for 20 senior representatives of law enforcement and prosecutorial authorities and educational institutions from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan in Vienna, Austria.

VIENNA, 13 June 2024 – “The failure to guarantee media freedom and healthy information spaces is increasingly disillusioning and disenfranchising people throughout the OSCE region,” stated OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media (RFoM) Teresa Ribeiro in her address to OSCE participating States. Presenting her seventh and final bi-annual report to the Permanent Council, she highlighted escalating repression against the media and its detrimental impact on democratic principles and security across the OSCE region and urged States to bolster efforts to safeguard media freedom for the benefit of peace and security.

On 11 June, the OSCE Transnational Threats Department organized the concluding conference for the first phase of its flagship regional capacity-building initiative on combating cybercrime in Central Asia at the Hofburg in Vienna. The conference took stock of the project’s achievements over the last three years, and highlighted the main outcomes and lessons learned from its implementation.

On 28 and 29 May, the Heads of Asset Management Agencies from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Moldova, North Macedonia and Ukraine gathered in Skopje, North Macedonia for a meeting of the Steering Group of the Balkan Asset Management Interagency Network (BAMIN).

The OSCE has taken a proactive position in addressing human rights abuses within supply chains, particularly focusing on preventing and combating human trafficking and labour exploitation in the tourism sector.

On 27- 30 May 2024, the final simulation-based exercise on combating human trafficking took place in the Lviv region, concluding the comprehensive 2-year training initiative by the OSCE Support Programme for Ukraine and IOM Representation in Ukraine.

From 3 to 7 June 2024, the OSCE Transnational Threats Department (TNTD) in close co-operation with the OSCE Presence in Albania, organized a training of trainers course on identifying forged documents and impostors at border crossing points in Tirana, Albania. The course brought together five officers, two women and three men, from the Albanian State Police and the Albanian Border Police.