OREANDA-NEWS  On 25 September was announced, that the seventh Annual Meeting of the Central Asia Border Security Initiative (CABSI) convened representatives of EU member states and Central Asian partners to review the progress of the Border Management (BOMCA) and Drug Action (CADAP) Programmes in Central Asia and to discuss their future direction and necessary funding.

CABSI is a consortium of EU member states led by Austria. Its members include the UK, Finland, France, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Croatia, Hungary and the USA as independent partner.

The history of annual CABSI meetings dedicated to discussions on BOMCA and CADAP Programmes dates back to the year of 2002, when at the suggestion of the CABSI Consortium the European Commission initiated its Border Management Programme in Central Asia.

Each year, the CABSI Consortium meets to review the progress of the BOMCA programme and to discuss its future direction and necessary funding. Before 2007 all annual CABSI meetings were held in Vienna. In September 2007 the sixth CABSI meeting was held in Central Asia, in the city of Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. The reason for organising the succeeding CABSI meetings in Central Asia was to ensure that senior representatives of Law Enforcement Agencies from the five Central Asian states also had an opportunity to participate and explain their priorities. This very productive and successful meeting, during which EU member states received first hand information from their partners, resulted in the consortiumҒs unanimous decision to hold future sessions in the region.