OREANDA-NEWS. The European Commission is holding a high-level conference on ‘EU energy cooperation with the Eastern Neighbourhood and Central Asia’ to mark 20 years of working together on energy matters.

Maroš Šefčovič,, European Commission Vice President of the Energy Union and Johannes Hahn, European Commissioner for European Neighbourhood Policy and Enlargement, is attending the event. It is uniting high-level representatives from the EU, partner countries, international financial institutions, think tanks and the private sector.

The conference is discussing the most important achievements made between the EU and its Eastern and Central Asian partner countries on energy security and sustainability under the INOGATE programme.

INOGATE offers technical assistance programmes on energy and works with 11 partner countries to help reduce their dependency on fossil fuel imports, improve their energy security, mitigate climate change and attract investment in energy projects of regional interest.

The partner countries are organised by region:

  • Eastern Europe: Belarus, Moldova and Ukraine with its Secretariat in Kiev
  • Caucasus: Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia with its Secretariat in Tbilisi
  • Central Asia: Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan with its Secretariat in Tashkent.

To date, INOGATE has successfully implemented 70 projects.