IOM Chief commends Sri Lanka’s dynamism and perseverance as Chair of the Colombo Process
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IOM Ambassador William Lacy Swing, Sri Lankan Ambassador Ravinatha Aryasinha and Nepalee Ambassador Deepak Dhital
Director General of the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), Ambassador William Lacy Swing has commended Sri Lanka on its dynamism and perseverance as the Chair of the Colombo Process (CP) which has led to numerous achievements, and steered the CP to a progressive path and to a very good future.
The Colombo Process is a Regional Consultative Process on the management of overseas employment and contractual labour for countries of origin in Asia, which accounts for over 45 million migrants workforce and the welfare of their family members. The group of 12 includes Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam.
Noting that due to its regular engagement, CP is among the strongest Global Regional Consultative Processes, Ambassador Swing commended Nepal for taking up the leadership of the process, adding that the IOM stood ready to continue supporting the Chair of the CP, according to a media release from Sri Lanka’s mission in Geneva.
Ambassador Swing made these observations on the occasion of the transfer of the Chair of the CP, from the Government of Sri Lanka to the Government Nepal, during a meeting held at the IOM Headquarters in Geneva last week.
Sri Lanka which assumed the CP Chair for a second time in October 2013, developed a ‘road map’ which sought to strengthen engagement between CP Member States and countries of destination, under the overall theme “International Labour Migration for Prosperity: Adding Value by Working Together”.
Initially 5 thematic areas were identified and working groups comprising experts in each considered pragmatic ways and means on how to: promote skills qualification and recognition; foster ethical recruitment; promote pre-departure orientation and empowerment with an additional focus on migration and health; reduce the costs of remittances transfer; and track labour market trends. In August 2016 at the 5th Ministerial Meeting held in Colombo led by the CP Chair-in-Office Minister of Foreign Employment Talatha Atukorale, the CP expanded its scope by adding four more thematic areas, namely: enhancing consular support for migrant workers; promoting migrant health; operationalising the migration-related goals in the SDGs; and promoting equality of women migrant workers.
Speaking on the occasion as the Chair of the Geneva-based CP operational platform, Sri Lanka’s Permanent Representative to the UN in Geneva Ambassador Ravinatha Aryasinha said, “Over the past 3 ½ years Sri Lanka had sought to build an overarching institutional architecture, to overcome the conventional wisdom, that the CP countries in most instances being competitors, were beyond the capacity of leveraging as a group”.