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The Senior Officials´ Meeting of the Prague Process held in Cracow on 15-16 June gathered numerous representatives of the Prague Process participating countries. This represented a great opportunity to ask participants about their opinion on this intergovernmental platform and the Targeted Initiative, which helps to implement it and tackle on a practical level its priorities. What feedback have they provided? What positive do they see in the Prague Process? All their answers, ideas and thoughts were captured in a set of short video interviews, which are now available for viewing on our homepage, in the section Media and also on ICMPD YouTube channel. These messages represent a promise for the approaching 3rd Ministerial Conference, which will be held in Bratislava on 19-20 September 2016, and where the Ministers will have to decide in which direction the Process should move in the future.

As a final result of the recently finished Pilot Project 6 on Student mobility and the Pilot Project 7 on Asylum and International Protection, following the official endorsement at the Senior Officials' Meeting in Cracow on 15-16 of June 2016, the “Prague Process Handbook on Enhancing International Student Mobility” and the Handbook “Quality in Asylum Decision Making: Using Jurisprudence and Multidisciplinary Knowledge for Training Purposes” were published on the Prague Process and ICMPD websites.

Both documents were drafted in close cooperation with the respective leading states - Czech Republic & Hungary, Sweden & Germany -  and in consultation with the Prague Process participating states. Their format is of rather practical nature and should eventually serve for training purposes.

Both documents are available for download in the section Key/Programme Documents.

The Senior Officials’ Meeting gathered 62 participants from 29 states, as well as the European Commission, the Council of the EU, Frontex, UNHCR and ICMPD. The Meeting served the discussion of the past achievements, of the possible future activities and the preparations of the upcoming 3rd Ministerial Conference “Addressing Challenges Together”, taking place in Bratislava on 19-20 September 2016. At this occasion, Ministers are expected to endorse the Joint Declaration, which shall constitute a clear basis for future endeavours in the period 2017-2021. The SOM also provided the attending states with an opportunity to express their national priorities and the scope of their future commitment and support to the PP. The joint ownership of the Process is important and should be further sustained through a strong political message in the form of the Joint Ministerial Declaration, the content of which was extensively discussed in Cracow.

Following a number of consultations and further endorsement by the respective migration authorities the Migration Profiles Light 2015 of the Republic of Kazakhstan and the Republic of Uzbekistan were published on the Prague Process website. The process of approval has been arranged in line with the agreed during the Senior Officials' Meeting (Budapest, 2015) methodology which gives each state a three-month period for provision of any feedback, followed by an official endorsement.

A special positive role in finalisation of both documents should be devoted to the Prague Process Expert missions to the Republics of Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, which took place in August 2015. A close cooperation between the respective migration authorities and the Prague Process Support Team allowed to swiftly modify and harmonise both documents, and today we have an honor to share both profiles with you.

Both profiles are available for download in the section Migration Profiles, as well as from the Overview table of the section Migration Profile Light.

The 3rd Seminar of Pilot Project 7, that took place in Berlin on 20-22 of April 2016,  gathered 46 participants, including representatives of Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Czech Republic, Georgia, Germany, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Luxemburg, Moldova, Poland, Russia, Serbia, Sweden, Turkey and Ukraine, as well as the three PP7 experts, national trainers from Germany, Sweden and Norway, EASO, UNHCR, ECRE and ICMPD. The thematic focus of the event was on exclusion, internal protection alternative, interview techniques and vulnerable groups. The event combined presentations on behalf of experts with interactive breakout sessions, including the discussion of concrete asylum cases on behalf of participants.

The Final Workshop of the Pilot Project 5 on Illegal migration in Bucharest was hosted by the Ministry of Interior of Romania on 24-25 of February 2016 and gathered representatives of Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Hungary, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, former Yugoslav republic of Macedonia, Moldova, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Turkey, Ukraine, and representatives of the IOM and ICMPD.

The 2nd Seminar of Pilot Project 7, which took place in Brussels on 17-19 of February 2016,  gathered representatives of Albania, Armenia, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Germany, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Luxemburg, Moldova, Poland, Russia, Serbia, Sweden, Turkey and Ukraine, as well as various experts, representatives of the European Commission, UNHCR, ECRE and ICMPD.

Representatives of the Swedish Migration Agency (SMA) and the German Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) as the leading states authorities of the Pilot Project 7  opened the event, underlining the importance of training in view of the significant flows of asylum seekers received at present. Both states reported on the substantial increase in the number of staff and the resulting need for in-house training. In this context, countries can certainly benefit from the experience of other states.

From the 12th to the 13th of February 2016, in the framework of Objective 2, the Prague Process Secretariat organised a Prague Process National Contact Points’ meeting on the Knowledge base, data collection and analysis. Hosted by the Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Bulgaria, the meeting took place in Sofia, Bulgaria, and gathered participants from 26 states, the European Commission Representation in Sofia and Frontex, as well as the ICMPD, the OSCE and the UNHCR.

The meeting gathered representatives of Albania, Armenia, Belarus, the Czech Republic, Georgia, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Portugal, Russia, Sweden and Turkey, as well as ICMPD and the Prague Process Secretariat.   

The Prague Process Senior Officials’ Meeting, being at the same time the second preparatory SOM for the 3rd Ministerial Conference in October 2016, took place in Prague on 7-8 December 2015, gathering participants from 30 states, the European Commission Directorate General for Home Affairs (DG HOME) and Directorate General for International Cooperation and Development (DG DEVCO), the Council of the European Union, the European External Action Service (EEAS), the European Asylum Support Office (EASO), Frontex, as well as ICMPD, IOM and UNHCR.