News

At the beginning of February BOMCA invited two EU experts from the Customs Authority of the Republic of Lithuania to facilitate working meetings with key national partners from the State Revenue Committee of the Ministry of Finance of the Republic of Kazakhstan and the State Customs Service under the Government of the Kyrgyz Republic. During the working meetings, Ms. Vida Mickiene and Mr. Rimantas Rackauskas conducted discussions on the Revised Kyoto Convention (RKC) and its implementation aspects in Kazakhstan and reviewed the compatibility of the national legislation of Kyrgyzstan with the General Annex of the RKC. Kazakhstan is the only country from the Central Asian region which has acceded to the Convention and they presented their cumulative experience of implementation of its provisions; Kyrgyzstan is carrying out measures to reform and improve the customs legislation for accession.

On 21 January 2016, the State Border Guard of Latvia conducted a BOMCA informational meeting for stakeholders. The event gathered representatives from embassies of the Central Asian countries accredited in Latvia, members of the BOMCA Consortium – the Customs Department under the Ministry of Finance of the Republic of Lithuania, Riga Technical University, the Food and Veterinary Service of the Ministry of Agriculture of Latvia – and representatives from the Ministries of Foreign Affairs of Latvia and Lithuania, the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Latvia and the Representation of the European Commission in Latvia. 

On 17 December 2015, the BOMCA Programme facilitated the 5th meeting of the Inter-Agency Commission on Development and Implementation of the Integrated Border Management (IBM) system in the Kyrgyz Republic. The main goal of the Commission is to steer and coordinate the efforts of all agencies involved in implementation of the National IBM Strategy 2012 – 2022.

On 27 November 2015, the First Regional Steering Group meeting gathered together delegates from the border, customs and migration agencies of the Central Asian countries and representatives of the implementing partners in order to discuss plans for the first year of the programme implementation.

On 26 November 2015 in Bishkek, the 9^th phase of the Border Management Programme in Central Asia (BOMCA), together with the 6^th phase of the Central Asia Drug Action Programme (CADAP), held a joint conference which marked the official launch of both programmes

On 25 November, the Regional Office of BOMCA was officially opened in Bishkek in order to facilitate implementation of the programme at the national and regional levels.

From late September to the beginning of November five missions to Central Asian countries took place, becoming the first activities in the region under the 9^th phase of BOMCA. The team, consisting of representatives from the Riga Technical University, the Latvian Border Guard, the Customs Department of Lithuania and ICMPD, met with representatives of border, customs and migration agencies in each of the countries visited, namely Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan.