Transfrontier Cooperation Program

About this grant

The EastWest Institute’s Transfrontier Cooperation Program, known as the Centre for Border Cooperation and launched in 1999, promotes the development of an integrated Europe and addresses the danger of new dividing lines separating the European Union accession and nonaccession countries in Central/Eastern Europe (CEE) and Russia. Through the center, nonprofit sector representatives, business leaders, and local and regional government officials from communities in CEE and Russia border areas work together to create sustainable, interest-based, cross-border institutions and practices.Multiyear funding will enable the center to help institutions in Southeastern Europe bridge the growing divides in Europe; form an advisory service team to share experiences and best practices with new border areas requiring assistance; and develop border-related policy competencies by defining new ways to balance freedom and security in border management solutions while maintaining cross-border cooperation at the local level.Accomplishments during the past two years included holding a policy forum to discuss positive developments in cross-border cooperation; convening a series of meetings in preparation for the Council of Europe conference on transfrontier cooperation; building the capacity of Euroregional structures in the Prespa-Ohrid region (Albania, Greece and Macedonia); and supporting the implementation of a Pilot Scheme for Integrated Border Management in the Southern Adriatic border region (Serbia and Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Croatia).