EU AND MONGOLIA TO CELEBRATE 25TH ANNIVERSARY OF COOPERATION

Ulaanbaatar /MONTSAME/ Visiting these days the European Commissioner for Education, Culture, Multilingualism and Youth Ms Androulla Vassiliou is to meet with the Mongolian leadership. In frames of her official visit, she intends to meet L.Bold, the Minister of Foreign Affairs; L.Gantomor, the Minister of Education and Science; Ts.Oyungerel, the Minister of Culture, Sport and Tourism. The aims are to take stock of relations between the EU and Mongolia, particularly in the area under the Commissioner's responsibility, and to extend the scope of the cooperation, consolidated following the signature of the Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (PCA), to cover people-to-people exchanges. "2014 is a special year for the EU-Mongolia ties, for we together celebrate their 25th anniversary. We have also witnessed a mutual growing interest to raise the level of the cooperation, including people-to-people exchanges," says the Commissioner. At the above meetings the Commissioner wants to underline the main objective of the PCA--to strengthen, promote and expand EU-Mongolia relations. A particular focus will be placed on the opportunities offered to Mongolian students and researchers through Erasmus+, the EU's new programme for education, training, youth and sport, and from the Marie Sklodowska Curie Actions, under the Horizon 2020 programme. The visit will continue until Tuesday. The Partnership and Cooperation Agreement was signed in 2013. There is no formal dialogue between the EU and Mongolia in the people-to-people area, however, Mongolia has participated in EU academic and research international cooperation and exchange programmes, notably: Five Mongolian institutions (Mongolian University of Science and Technology; Mongolian State University of Agriculture; Health Sciences University of Mongolia; National University of Mongolia; Institute of Finance and Economics) have participated in Erasmus Mundus projects. The first two participated in two projects aimed at enhancing an attractiveness of European higher education in the world: 'ISEKI'_(on internationalisation and sustainability of food networks) and 'AskAsia' (on agriculture, skills, knowledge in Asia: competences and employability). 16 Mongolian students and 2 doctoral candidates have been selected to follow an Erasmus Mundus joint masters or PhD programme in the period 2004-2013. Exchanges involving 227 Mongolians have taken place, or are envisaged, under Erasmus Mundus partnerships in the period 2007-2016. So far only one Mongolian researcher has benefited from a Marie Curie fellowship, but this number is set to increase in the future as the programme becomes better known among Mongolian academics.