The Budapest Process: assessment of its 20-year activities

After the end of the 'cold war' European countries had to establish good relations to provide the continent with peace and stability. This aim was reached thanks to financial help granted by the EEC to the states of Eastern Europe. The latter revised their foreign policy in favour of Western neighbours. Meanwhile, the Western European states proceeded to political integration by signing the Maastricht Treaty in 1991 and initiating the European Union. The EU countries agreed to conduct common foreign and security policy and migration policy on the intergovernmental basis. However, they lacked resources at that moment, therefore, the EU had to find a different solution for its foreign policy problems, especially mass immigration flaws triggered by border changes in Europe. As a result, the EU launched special cooperation mechanisms with third countries for migration management. The first mechanism was the Budapest process - an intergovernmental dialogue of states and international organizations initiated at the First Ministerial Conference in Berlin on 31 October 1991. The issues of combating illegal immigration into the EU, readmission agreements and harmonization of visa policies were discussed there. The Second Ministerial Conference took place on 15-16 February 1993 in Budapest to adopt measures against illegal immigration including strengthening of border control, information exchange, improvement of the visa application procedures. In 1994, the International Centre for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD) was appointed the Secretariat of the Budapest Process. The Third Ministerial Conference was held in Prague on 15 October 1997 and adopted measures in harmonization of migration legislation and information exchange between the states. It resulted in the establishment of several working groups: on Legal Harmonization, Visa Policy Approximation, Return and Readmission, etc. So the functioning scheme of the Budapest Process settled down: Ministerial Conferences make crucial decisions and adopt multiannual strategies. Senior Officials Meetings are held once a year to specify the plans. Working groups operate on a regular basis. In the 2000s, the Budapest Process experienced crisis because it had attained its goal to help the countries of Central/Eastern Europe adopt the EU standards and prepare for the ascension. The Forth Ministerial Conference held on 25-26 June 2003 in Rhodes (Greece) tried to give a new impetus to the process by broadening its geographical scope (including the CIS countries) and adopting a global approach to migration, starting thereby the second phase of the process. In 2006, Turkey was appointed the Chair; it prepared suggestions on amelioration of the process which had to be discussed at the 2009 Conference. However, the Prague Process was started then. As a result, the Budapest Process found itself in crisis again. To revive the Budapest Process, the 16th Senior Officials Meeting held in Istanbul on 3 November 2010 made a decision to further broaden the geographical scope and include the Silk Route countries; the working format was optimized: three working groups were founded: on the South Eastern European Region, on the Black Sea Region and on the Silk Route Region. The interdependence of migration and development became the leading idea of the process. The third phase of the process was started. The Fifth Ministerial Conference on 19 April 2013 summed up the results of the Budapest Process activities for 20 years. It was acknowledged that the Budapest Process had become an efficient intergovernmental dialogue on migration management in Eurasia.

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