1st Video-Conference Meeting of the Migration Coordination Group of the Turkic Council was held on 7 August 2020.
This Group was created on the proposal of the Secretariat for timely informing the Member and Observer States of the Turkic Council and coordinating the necessary measures to solve visa and migration issues of the citizens as well as implementation of the agreed decisions and further expansion of cooperation during and after pandemic.
The meeting was moderated by Dr. Ömer Kocaman, Deputy Secretary General of the Turkic Council and attended by the Heads of relevant Departments of the Migration Services of the Member States mainly to discuss legalization of the activities of labour migrants from Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan in the territories of the Member States of the Turkic Council.
Deputy Secretary General briefed the Parties on the outcomes of the the 1st Video-conference Meeting of the Heads of the Migration Services and related authorities of the Member and Observer States of the Turkic Council held on 7 May 2020 and emphasized that the Parties agreed to ease the immigration requirements to allow citizens of the Member States to stay in the destination country beyond the usual time limit and to abstain from administrative/punitive actions against each other’s citizens who violated visa and residence permit during the pandemic.
Uzbek and Kyrgyz sides gave detailed information on the issues of the labour migrants working in in the territory of the Member States of the Turkic Council, especially in Kazakhstan and Turkey. They underlined that these migrants who work in the underpaid jobs contributes to the economies of country of origin as well as destination and asked other Parties to extend necessary assistance to those affected citizens as well.
Kazakh and Turkish sides agreed to reconsider this issue with the respective Ministries of Labour and help those categories of labour migrants.
The Parties also shared requirements of legislation on labour migration, as well as statistical data on citizens residing or currently staying in the territory of the Member or Observer States, including those who are unable to leave their destination countries due to the pandemic and agreed to create a single database in the framework of the Turkic Council.
