On November 4, 2021, Valdis Dombrovskis, Executive Vice President of the European Commission and European Commissioner for Trade, met with Māris Domins, Head of the Regional Office for the Border Management Program in Central Asia and Afghanistan (BOMCA 10), in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, and visited the Customs Training Center of the State Customs Service of Kyrgyzstan.
During the meeting, representatives of the European Commission, the Delegation of the European Union to the Kyrgyz Republic and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Kyrgyz Republic were briefed on the achievements of previous phases of the BOMCA program in the Central Asian region, especially in Kyrgyzstan. Participants discussed the plans of the BOMCA program 10th Phase , launched in April this year, and the director of the Kyrgyz Customs Training Center presented the infrastructure of the training center and cynology center, as well as shared the information on the BOMCA programme's contribution to the development of the customs cynology center and and acquisition of the equipment.
Border Management Programme in Central Asia and Afghanistan is funded by the European Union and implemented by the Consortium of border management institutions in the EU Member States institutions and ICMPD, led by the State Border Guard of the Republic of Latvia. The project started on 1 April 2021 with a budget of 21.65 M EUR for 54 months period. BOMCA-10aims at enhancing security, stability and sustainable growth in the region, while supporting cross-border cooperation and improve living conditions for people living in the border areas of Central Asia and Afghanistan. Thematically, the project covers four components: institutional development of border management agencies, improvement of detection capacities, trade facilitation and improvement of cross-border cooperation. Geographically, the project covers six countries in the region (Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan).
BOMCA is the flagship and the largest EU-funded Programme in the region. Since its launch in 2003, the its various phases have focused on capacity building and institutional development, developing trade corridors and facilitation of trade, improving border management systems and fightingdrug trafficking across the Central Asia region. Each new phase of BOMCA, including the ongoing one, was designed to gradually build upon and increase the results achieved during the preceding phases.
