UNIS/INF/27
3 September 2004
OSCE/UNODC Bring Together International Experts on Border Management and Security
VIENNA, 3 September (UN Information Service) -- Experts from more than a dozen international organizations around the world will focus on promoting more effective border management and security at a meeting in Vienna next week.
The Technical Experts Conference on 7 and 8 September, held by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) will be the first of its kind. The aim of the conference will be to share international organizations’ experience in promoting more effective border management and security, and to develop a more strategic and coordinated approach to delivering international assistance.
Security reports show that Europe is not alone in being a key destination for criminal groups. With a potential European consumer market of US$30 billion for the heroin trafficked from Afghanistan through the Central Asian or South-East European routes, with hundreds of thousands of women trafficked for sexual exploitation and with many other forms of transnational organized crime, the conference in Vienna is of crucial importance.
Border and security experts from the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), European Commission, North-Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), International Organization for Migration (IOM), Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe, Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), Europol, World Customs Organization (WCO), Wassenaar Arrangement on Export Controls for Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods & Technologies, International Centre for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD), and Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) are among those that will attend the event.
Bulgarian Vice Foreign Minister, Ivan Petkov, representing the OSCE Chairmanship and Bernard Frahi, Chief, Partnership in Development Branch of the UNODC, will deliver opening speeches.
Representatives from the 55 OSCE participating States and the Organizations' 10 Partners will also send their experts.
The two-day event is closed to the media. Journalists interested in interviewing participants should contact:
Jaya Mohan, Associate Information Officer, UNIS
Phone: +43-1-26060-4448 email: jaya.mohan@unvienna.org
or
Ayhan Evrensel, Press Officer, OSCE
Phone: +43-1-51436533 email: ayhan.evrensel@osce.org
* *** *
