On September 8-11, Armen Ghazaryan, Head of the Migration Service of Armenia, who is in Austria on a working visit, met in Vienna with Martijn Plum, Director Migration Dialogues and Cooperation at International Centre for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD) and Violeta Wagner, ICMPD’s Regional Portfolio Manager for Eastern Europe and Central Asia.
The parties discussed bilateral cooperation and the possibility of its continuation. Ghazaryan highly assessed the effectiveness of the ICMPD program, which has been operating in the Migration Service since 2018, within the framework of which about 1000 returnees received reintegration assistance.
The Head of the Migration Service also presented the initiative implemented within the framework of the same program, which envisages conducting a series of capacity building courses for the return and reintegration staff of the Migration Service, as well as for other specialists related to the field.
Among the valuable initiatives implemented in Armenia with the support of an international organization is the construction of a new shelter for more than 100 asylum seekers, about which the Head of the Migration Service expressed his satisfaction with his colleagues.
The IMPACT program, launched in Armenia with the support of ICMPD and EU, was discussed with Plum and Wagner. Within the framework of the program, it is planned to provide financial support to labor migrants returning to Armenia and their family members on a 1 + 1 basis in order to establish their own business, which will direct their funds to settling in the Homeland, local development and job creation.
