News and press releases

BERN / MOSTAR, 29 August 2014 – Didier Burkhalter, Swiss Foreign Minister and OSCE Chairperson-in-Office, congratulated the Presidents of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Montenegro and Serbia for being the first signatories of a declaration on the issue of conflict-related missing persons...

VIENNA, 23 August 2014 – On behalf of the Swiss OSCE Chairmanship, Ambassador Thomas Greminger, Chair of the OSCE Permanent Council, expressed his heartfelt condolences to the Government of Lithuania and the family of Mykola Zelenec, the Honorary Consul of Lithuania, who was murdered by illegally armed groups in Luhansk. The perpetrators must be brought to justice, Greminger underlined, and condemned the tragic murder. This is another sad indicator that violence in the east of Ukraine must be ended and that all needs to be done to de-escalate the situation urgently in order to find back to meaningful dialogue, Greminger concluded.

BERN, August 23, 2014 – Deploring that the agreement by Ukraine and the Russian Federation on the modalities of delivering the convoy aid was not implemented in good faith, Didier Burkhalter, Swiss Minister of Foreign Affairs and OSCE Chairperson-in-Office, called on all parties to exercise maximum restraint and refrain from any actions which could contribute to the further escalation of the situation. Stressing that humanitarian aid had to be delivered in accordance with humanitarian principles and in full respect of Ukrainian sovereignty, Burkhalter urged all sides to help transform this convoy aid into a cooperative endeavor again.

BERN, 8 August 2014- OSCE Chairperson-in-Office and Swiss Foreign Minister, Didier Burkhalter, welcomed today’s announcement by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) that it would step up activities for the affected population in deteriorating humanitarian and security environments and deploy additional teams...

TBILISI, 4 August 2014 – Ambassador Andrzej Kasprzyk, the Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office on the conflict dealt with by the OSCE Minsk Conference, made the following statement today following recent media reports...

BERN/MOSCOW/PARIS/WASHINGTON, 2 August 2014 – The OSCE Chairperson-in-Office and Swiss Foreign Minister, Didier Burkhalter, together with the Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group, Ambassadors Igor Popov of the Russian Federation, James Warlick of the United States of America, and Pierre Andrieu of France, expressed their deep concern about the intense upsurge in violence along the Line of Contact and Armenian-Azerbaijani border that resulted in numerous casualties reported in recent days. They extended their condolences to the families of the victims and shared the anguish of their grievous losses...

On 30 July 2014 the 47th meeting under the Incident Prevention and Response Mechanism (IPRM) took place in Ergneti, co-facilitated by Toivo Klaar, the Head of the EU Monitoring Mission in Georgia (EUMM), and Ambassador Angelo Gnaedinger, the Special Representative of the Swiss OSCE Chairmanship for the South Caucasus...