News and press releases

The Secretary General of the World Customs Organization (WCO), Kunio Mikuriya, and the First Deputy Chairman of the State Customs Service of the Kyrgyz Republic (SCS), Shamil Berdaliev, signed a Memorandum of Understanding at the WCO Secretariat in Brussels on 19 December, thereby accrediting the SCS’s Training Centre as a WCO Regional Training Centre...

On 20 December at 08:20 (Moscow time), the eighty-second Russian convoy arrived at the Donetsk Border Crossing Point (BCP). A total of 22 vehicles were checked by Russian Federation border guards and customs officers prior to their crossing into Ukraine. All 22 vehicles had crossed back into the Russian Federation by 20:57 on 20 December.

VIENNA, 20 December 2018 – Wolfgang Benedek, OSCE Moscow Mechanism rapporteur, presented to the OSCE Permanent Council today his report on alleged human rights violations and impunity in the Chechen Republic of the Russian Federation...

• Compared with the previous reporting period, the SMM recorded more ceasefire violations in Donetsk region and a similar number of ceasefire violations in Luhansk region. • The Mission recorded ceasefire violations near the Zolote disengagement area. • Small-arms fire was directed at an SMM mini-unmanned aerial vehicle near Novotoshkivske.* • The SMM saw weapons in violation of the withdrawal lines near Bakhmut, Kostiantynivka and Lysychansk. • The Mission continued to observe long queues of civilians travelling across the contact line near Stanytsia Luhanska. • The SMM facilitated and monitored adherence to the ceasefire to enable repair works to essential civilian infrastructure and damaged houses in Marinka and Krasnohorivka. It continued to facilitate the operation of the Donetsk Filtration Station. • Restrictions of the Mission’s access continued in all three disengagement areas.*

CHISINAU, 20 December 2018- Accessing new markets by improving digital skills was the focus of a three-day training course held for the representatives of small and medium-sized enterprises, which concluded today in Chisinau...

The OSCE Mission to Skopje presented today a Legal Commentary on the Law on Criminal Procedure, the first of its kind, prepared by a group of legal experts that will help lawyers, judges and prosecutors apply the Law in a better and more uniform fashion in the courts.

A two-day train-the-trainer course aimed at strengthening the capacity of Albania to disrupt the financing of terrorist networks was held on 18 and 19 December 2018 in Vienna...