News and press releases

The last in a series of six OSCE-supported five-day training courses on risk profiling at border checkpoints to assist eighteen officers of the Border Service of Kazakhstan’s National Security Committee in countering transnational threats concluded in Kostanai, Kazakhstan on 4 August 2017...

Some 100 law-enforcement officers, social workers and representatives of the local Akimat (regional administration) from the Atyrau, Aktobe, Mangystau and Western Kazakhstan regions as well as the city of Aktau took part in the last in a series of four OSCE-supported training seminars on anti-trafficking practices and procedures in Aktau, Kazakhstan, which concluded on 4 August 2017....

The SMM recorded more ceasefire violations in Donetsk and Luhansk regions compared with the previous reporting period. The Mission continued monitoring the disengagement areas near Stanytsia Luhanska, Zolote and Petrivske and noted a calm situation. Its access remained restricted there and elsewhere, including at Verkhnoshyrokivske where armed “DPR” members impeded the SMM’s access to areas east of Mariupol for a sixth consecutive day. It facilitated and monitored adherence to the ceasefire to enable repairs at the power plant in Shchastia and at the Petrivske water pumping station in Artema. The SMM monitored one border area not under government control...

VIENNA, 3 August 2017 – OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media Harlem Désir today expressed his concern in a letter to the Polish Minister of Foreign Affairs regarding the decision by the Ministry of Defence to file a complaint against journalist Tomasz Piątek. The Defence Ministry claims that Piątek may have committed a criminal offence in publishing his new book, Macierewicz and His Secrets...

The OSCE Presence in Albania is inviting prospective candidates to apply for its Youth Trail initiative, a programme aiming to promote the OSCE values of democracy, co-operation, peace and security among young people in the Western Balkans...

MINSK, 3 August 2017 – The Special Representative of the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office in Ukraine and in the Trilateral Contact Group (TCG), Ambassador Martin Sajdik, made the following statement to the press after the meeting of the TCG and its working groups in Minsk on 2 August 2017:...

The SMM recorded more ceasefire violations, but fewer explosions in Donetsk region and fewer ceasefire violations in Luhansk region compared with the previous reporting period. The SMM continued monitoring the disengagement areas. The SMM cameras recorded ceasefire violations between 2km and 10km east and east-north-east and west of the Zolote and Stanytsia Luhanska disengagement areas respectively, all assessed as outside the disengagement areas. Its access remained restricted there and elsewhere. Armed “DPR” members impeded the SMM’s access to areas east of Mariupol for a fifth consecutive day in Verkhnoshyrokivske. For more than seven hours “DPR” members held the SMM and its monitoring equipment at checkpoints near non-government-controlled Olenivka and prevented it from leaving.* The SMM facilitated and monitored adherence to the ceasefire to enable repairs of infrastructure in Shchastia, Zolote and Artema. The Mission visited one border area not under government control...