UNIPATH STAFF
An international seminar in Turkmenistan about humanitarian assistance to refugees, migrants and internally displaced persons — all the more relevant with the Taliban takeover in Afghanistan — drew attendance from four Central Asian nations in March 2022.
The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) invited dozens of officials from around the region to Turkmenistan’s capital of Ashgabat. In addition to attendees from border agencies in Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, participants came from the OSCE, the United Nations, nongovernmental organizations, and the EU-funded Border Management Assistance Program in Central Asia.
John MacGregor, head of the OSCE Centre in Ashgabat, stressed the importance of comprehensive migration management at the regional level.
“All over the world, millions of people are moving, most often involuntarily, as a result of man-made or environmental shocks, including the OSCE region. Therefore, promoting an effective migration policy is an area of strategic importance for stability and economic growth,” MacGregor said.
The officials from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan shared their countries’ best practices in migration management. Attendees highlighted intergovernmental and interagency cooperation in managing migration, noting that cross-border movement of people is a characteristic feature of the 21st century and will remain so in the future.
Sponsored by the government of Norway, the seminar was part of an OSCE project called “Strengthening Border Service Capacities in Turkmenistan.” Source: OSCE