The first high-level regional meeting in Europe devoted to civil aviation security as part of a new concept initiated by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) will be held on April 6 in Bucharest, the Romanian Foreign Ministry (MAE) reports in a press release.
The meeting is part of the series of events to be held in Romania by the ICAO in 2009 that will also be attended by the other members of the Central Europe Rotation Group (CERG). Romania is currently a member on the ICAO Council and a CERG representative for its tenure (2009-2010).
Expected to attend the April 6 meeting in Bucharest are officials of civil aviation authorities from CERG member states – Romania, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Slovenia – the new ICAO Secretary General and other members of the ICAO leadership, as well as officials for international organisations specialising in civil aviation.
On the sidelines of the high-level meeting, a training course will be conducted in international civil aviation security, which is also part of the series of events to be hosted by Romania and ICAO in 2009, as well as the bi-annual CERG meeting.
The schedule of events is thought to mark out the importance of auditing in the matter of international civil aviation security and to provide comprehensive training for experts from the participating countries, and it is introduced at diplomatic meetings and specialist aviation meetings of the European Union.
Romania is holding the ICAO chairmanship on behalf of the EU throughout June 2009, in the name of the Czech Republic, after having held the chairmanship January – June 2008 in the name of Slovenia.
Romania currently has five simultaneous tenures in the area of international civil aviation it is a member on the ICAO Council;
it holds the deputy chairmanship of the ICAO Air Transport Committee, the deputy chairmanship of the ICAO Multidisciplinary Group; it is a member on the Coordination Committee of the European Civil Aviation Conference and it is also a deputy chair of the Provisional Council of the European Organisation for Air Navigation Security.
The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) is a specialised agency of the United Nations and was created with the signing in Chicago, on December 7, 1944, of the Convention on International Civil Aviation. ICAO is the permanent body charged with the administration of the principles laid out in the convention. It sets the standards for aviation safety, security, efficiency and regularity, as well as for aviation environmental protection, and encourages their implementation.