Between 22-24 June BOMCA-invited trainer-experts Ms. Gunta Laganovska, Chief of the Examination Service of the State Border Guard of Latvia, and Mr. Tibor Kovács, international consultant, conducted regional training of trainers workshops on document security for relevant national experts from border agency training institutions and border control officers from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. The event was organised in cooperation with OSCE.

The main goal of the event was to provide trainings on further usage of the training curriculum on document security and to exchange best practices. The participants learnt about EU practices on document security – technical and legal requirements for secured documents, protection levels, methods of falsification and verification means. 

The event’s packed agenda included a variety of interactive tools, group and individual practical exercises on such topics as types of document security, use of technical means for verification of documents and falsification detection; processing of documents; ways of document production and requirements for inks; and composition of documents, their stapling, perforation and personalisation methods, and main and additional security features. The training process effectively combined theory and practical exercises, and was accompanied by interactive tools and methods such as presentations, practical examples, videos and visualisation slides.

The training was intended not only to enhance the professional development of border agency training institutions and provide a basic curriculum with visual materials, but also to strengthen the professional network – a regional list of contacts of experts for information exchange on document security among the Central Asian border agencies was developed. Also, the synergy of international stakeholders facilitating the event brought an added value to the workshop in terms of combination of experience, strengthening cooperation and expanding information and knowledge flows.

Similar regional events will be held later in 2016 for another group of trainees. Furthermore, training curricula will be developed by the experts and handed over to the newly trained experts in order to equip them with a theoretical foundation for their future internal trainings in their respective agencies.