The 104th meeting of the Incident Prevention and Response Mechanism (IPRM) took place today in Ergneti, under the co-facilitation of Ambassador Marek Szczygieł, Head of the EU Monitoring Mission in Georgia (EUMM), and Ambassador Viorel Moşanu, newly appointed Special Representative of the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office for the South Caucasus.

Both co-facilitators opened the meeting by welcoming the commitment of the participants to the IPRM format and the use of the EUMM-managed Hotline to raise and address issues of concern. Ambassador Moşanu referred to the priorities of the 2022 OSCE Polish Chair and vowed to continue previous efforts and focus.

During the meeting, participants focused on ongoing detention cases and discussed the impact that the protracted closure of crossing points and the COVID-19 pandemic continue to have on conflict-affected communities, impacting women, men, the elderly and children differently. They also discussed the most recent security developments at the Administrative Boundary Line (ABL), including instances of “borderization”, as well as the situation in the Chorchana - Tsnelisi area.

The co-facilitators noted with concern the increased number of detentions in recent weeks and called for a humanitarian approach to all detention cases. They expressed their readiness to support efforts to contribute to resuming a greater freedom of movement and allowing conflict-affected populations to secure their livelihoods.

All necessary mitigation measures were in place to allow the participants to meet safely in spite of the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic situation was also discussed widely as part of the respective security context.

The participants agreed to convene the next IPRM meeting on 4 March.