Turkmenistan

The European Council has adopted “The EU and Central Asia: Strategy for a New Partnership” in June 2007 and the first progress report followed in June 2008.

A Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (PCA) with Turkmenistan has been signed in May 1998, and it still awaits ratification by the EU Member States and the European Parliament. The related Interim Agreement was signed in November 1998, but is not yet operational. In 2004 the EU resumed its Joint Committee meetings with Turkmenistan.

The future EC bilateral assistance will focus on the following priority areas: economic reforms, market and regulatory reforms (notably in the energy sector), capacity building, promotion of civil society, agriculture and rural development.

The overall EU co-operation objectives, policy responses and priority fields for Central Asia can be found in the EC Regional Strategy Paper for Central Asia 2007-2013 and Central Asia Indicative Programme 2007-2010 . In addition to the assistance under the Development Cooperation Instrument (DCI) , Turkmenistan participates in several ongoing regional programmes.