News and press releases

Milan, 5 December 2018 – On the eve of the 25th OSCE Ministerial Council, top-level OSCE representatives attended the closing session of the OSCE Parallel Civil Society Conference that took place today. They received recommendations directed at the OSCE’s executive and political bodies, institutions and participating States.

Compared with the previous reporting period, the SMM recorded more ceasefire violations in Donetsk and Luhansk regions. The Mission observed damage to a house caused by shelling in a residential area of Chermalyk. The SMM recorded ceasefire violations, including over 20 explosions, inside the Stanytsia Luhanska disengagement area and observed fresh shrapnel damage. The Mission observed weapons in violation of withdrawal lines near Mykhailivka and Alchevsk. The SMM facilitated and monitored adherence to the ceasefire to enable repairs to essential civilian infrastructure and houses on both sides of the contact line. It continued to facilitate the operation of the Donetsk Filtration Station. The Mission monitored a court hearing related to the detained Mekhanik Pogodin tanker; the court ruled that the tanker should continue to be detained. The Mission’s access remained restricted in all three disengagement areas. It was also restricted at two weapons storage sites in non-government-controlled areas of Donetsk region and near Novolaspa.*

Twenty five senior Tajik border officers of the Special Border Units successfully completed a four-week training course on sustained field operational capacities on 4 December 2018 in the Regional Training Centre of Khalkayor, some 230 km south of Dushanbe.

Understanding the challenges impeding the full access of Roma in Georgia to identity and civil registration documents, as well as the way forward to address this issue, was the focus of a roundtable event organized by the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) on 4

The OSCE Mission supported a workshop strengthening the capacity of fifty legal professionals from both banks of the Dniester/Nistru River to provide legal assistance to the population on documentation-related issues. The event took place on 30 November in Chisinau. Varying practices of the documentation process on both banks prevent the population from effectively exercising their rights. Issues related to civil status and documentation are a part of the discussions between Chisinau and Tiraspol within the framework of the settlement process.

Over 70 university students and teaching staff attended lectures on the role of women in the security and development process from 3 to 5 December 2018 in Ashgabat. The event was organized by OSCE Centre in Ashgabat. Swanee Hunt, the Eleanor Roosevelt Lecturer in Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government in the United States, delivered the lectures, focusing on women’s active participation in conflict prevention and resolution, peace building and policy making.

The Entrepreneurship Support Centre (ESC) in Osh, Kyrgyzstan’s second largest city, marked its first anniversary on 4 December 2018, in a celebration organized by the Centre together with the OSCE Programme Office in Bishkek. The mission of the ESC is to provide information and consulting support to entrepreneurs, as well as to form, prepare and promote high-quality business initiatives for the development of entrepreneurship in the Osh region.