Senior officials from the Defence Ministry and the State Border Service took part in the training session conducted by experts from the OSCE Secretariat and from Kazakhstan.

"Implementing confidence- and security-building measures is among the core areas of OSCE activities," said Ambassador Arsim Zekolli, the Head of the OSCE Centre in Ashgabat. "We welcome the host country’s increased interest towards the OSCE’s activities in this area and are looking forward to further deepening our co-operation, including by connecting Turkmenistan to the OSCE Communications Network."

Anton Martynyuk, the CSBM/Project Officer from the OSCE Conflict Prevention Centre in Vienna, added: "It is important to ensure that the OSCE politico-military commitments in Turkmenistan and the region as a whole are effectively implemented. We are especially pleased that this training workshop in Turkmenistan is held on the10th anniversary of the Istanbul Summit of 1999 where the Vienna Document on confidence- and security-building measures was adopted."

The two-day workshop included practical training sessions on matters related to the implementation of the Vienna Document 1999, in particular, airbase visits and verification activities, the OSCE Communications Network and the Code of Conduct Questionnaire.