On October 03–04, 2017 in Tallinn (Republic of Estonia) the Thirteenth Eastern Partnership Panel on Public Administration Reform (hereinafter — the Panel) of the Thematic Platform No 1 on Democracy, Good Governance and Stability in the framework of the EU initiative “Eastern Partnership” took place.

This meeting of the Panel, which is devoted to the discussion of openness and accountability issues in the context of the implementation of the of public administration reform, began with a working meeting of its participants with the Prime Minister of the Republic of Estonia Jüri Ratas, who congratulated the participants on the occasion of the opening of the event and expressed hope for fruitful and inspiring work.

Chair of the Thirteenth Eastern Partnership Panel, Deputy Head of Division for Eastern Partnership, Regional Cooperation and OSCE, Directorate for Russia, Eastern Partnership, Central Asia, Regional Cooperation and OSCE, European External Action Service Nils Jansons congratulated the participants on the occasion of the opening as well as carried out a general review of the implementation of the Work Programme of the Panel for 2014–2017.

During the first day of the event, representatives of the leading countries of the four spheres of the Panel reviewed the main achievements within the framework of the implementation of the Work Programme, as well as presented the main planned by the end of 2017 activities in the context of preparation for the holding Fifth Eastern Partnership Summit.

Director of the Center for Adaptation of the Civil Service to the Standards of the European Union Maryna Kanavets as the representative of the National Agency of Ukraine on Civil Service authorized to coordinate the activities of the Sphere 4 “Effective management of technical assistance” of the Panel, presented the main achievements within the framework of implementation of the activities during the reporting period, as well as outlined the prospects for the future. In addition, it was noted that preparations for the Annual Regional Conference on Institutional Building, which will take place on November 30 – December 1, 2017, have begun.

Furthermore, during the meeting, the main approaches to ensure the professionalization and establishment of ethical standards on the civil in the context of effective human resources management service were considered, discussed issues of inter-agency transparency and data exchange, principles of transparency and accountability, open government partnership, as well as the state of implementation of the main activities within the framework of the project “High Quality Studies to Support the Eastern Partnership – HiQSTEP”.

During the second day of the event participants took part in the conference on issues of cooperation in the area of e-governance "E-Partnership".

Representatives of the EU initiative "Eastern Partnership" member states, EU member states government authorities and public participated in the Panel.

The Ukrainian delegation was represented by Volodymyr KONDRACHUK, Sector Manager “Public Administration Reform” of Delegation of the EU to Ukraine, Oleksii HUZKO, Head of Division of Section for Donor Assistance, Communication and Translation of EU Law of the Government Office for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration of the Secretariat of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine and Tetiana GIRENKO, Second Secretary of Unit for Justice, Freedom and Security, Humanitarian and Cross- border Cooperation, Directorate General for the European Union, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine.

For reference: since 2011 Ukraine with the direct participation of NAUCS, takes an active part in the activities of the Working Group "Public Administration Reform" and constantly attends the meeting of the Working Group and events organized by the member countries of the Eastern Partnership. Such cooperation contributes facilitate to the realization of the NDAs tasks, in particular to ensure the formation and realization of the united state policy in the area of civil service etc.

Activities of the Working Group is aimed at the following directions:

• “Civil service, state authorities and their functions (human resource management, common principles of recruitment and civil service, legislation )”;
• “Transparency, e-government and data protection”;
• “Decentralization of local/regional state bodies”;
• “Effective management of technical assistance” (since 2012 Ukraine is the leading country).