News and press releases

The OSCE Centre in Bishkek supported a roundtable discussion in the Kyrgyz capital on 2 December 2016 focusing on the results of a needs assessment study by the Academy of Public Administration under the President of the Kyrgyz Republic (APAPKR) to identify the training requirements of parliamentary staff. It is first time Kyrgyzstan has conducted this kind of assessment since the country’s independence...

WARSAW, 2 December 2016 – Michael Georg Link, Director of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR), today condemned the execution in Belarus of Siarhei Khmialeuski and repeated his past calls for the authorities to introduce an immediate moratorium on executions...

VIENNA, 1 December 2016 – In their fifth briefing to the OSCE Permanent Council this year, the Special Representative of the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office in Ukraine and in the Trilateral Contact Group Martin Sajdik and the Chief Monitor of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) to Ukraine Ertugrul Apakan yesterday focused on the need for a real normalization and stabilization in eastern Ukraine, particularly through the implementation of the Minsk agreements.

The SMM recorded a similar number of ceasefire violations as in the previous reporting period in both Donetsk and Luhansk regions, but fewer explosions than during the previous reporting period in each of them. The SMM continued to monitor the disengagement areas in Stanytsia Luhanska, Zolote and Petrivske, and faced restrictions of its freedom of movement in all three areas.

On 30th November 2016, the 72nd meeting under the Incident Prevention and Response Mechanism (IPRM) took place in Ergneti, co-facilitated by Kęstutis Jankauskas, the Head of the European Union Monitoring Mission in Georgia (EUMM) and Ambassador Guenther Baechler, the Special Repre¬sentative of the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office for the South Caucasus...

Effective and human rights-compliant policing in Roma communities was the focus of a two-day training course for 20 Ukrainian police officers, organized by ODIHR from 30 November to 1 December in Odessa, Ukraine.

The Action against Terrorism Unit of the OSCE’s Transnational Threats Department, supported by the OSCE Mission to Serbia, held a three-day workshop in Belgrade from 29 November to 1 December 2016 on establishing an Advance Passenger Information (API) system in the country in line with international standards...