Fourth meeting of the International Advisory Group to the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative was held on April 5, 2006 in Baku, Azerbaijan. Delivering speech to the opening session the US, British, French and Norwegian Ambassadors appreciated Azerbaijan’s successful implementation of EITI. The US Ambassador to Azerbaijan Mr. Reno Harnish said that Azerbaijan was the leader for the activities on the EITI implementation.

After the opening session the IAG members (see:list) convened under the Chairman, Mr. Peter Eigen started discussions, which included current status of the EITI implementation in different countries and future management of EITI.

IAG members took the preparation up for the third internaitonal EITI Conference to be held in October, 2006 in Oslo. Senior representatives of the IAG member countries including, the US, the UK, Norway, France, Nigeria, and also the representatives of World Bank, IMF, BP, Anglo American, Chevron and non-governmental organizations, including Open Society Institute and Global Witness participated at the meeting.

On the next day (April 6, 2006) the international conference “EITI: Pilot countries’ experience” took place in Baku. Chairman of the National Committee on EITI, the Executive Director of the State Oil Fund of the Republic of Azerbaijan Mr. Samir Sharifov chaired the two-panel conference. He underlined that the Conference was arranged for helping EITI implementation in the resource-rich countries of the world. The Committee Chairman made a presentation on “Piloting EITI: Case of Azerbaijan” (see: presentation) and informed the meeting participants that the Azerbaijan government had publicized the EITI reports 3 times and the fourth report was underway.

Sir John Bourn UK Auditor General & Dr Laurie Bristow British Ambassador to Azerbaijan, Valeh Aleskerov, Vice- Speaker of the Parliament of Azerbaijan and Chairman of the Parliamentary Committee on Energy and Minerals, Graham Baxter, Vice – President of the BP Group, Shain Mustafayev, Vice-President of SOCAR and Sabit Bagirov, Coordinator of the NGO Coalition of Azerbaijan delivered speech on the first panel.

Members of the second panel, which titled “International perspectives of EITI implementation” were Mr. Michael Levitsky, World Bank Senior Economist, Mr. Stephen Krasner (see), Director for Policy Planning of the US State Department, USA, Ms. Karin Lissakers, Personal Adviser to George Soros and Open Society Institute, Mr. Raymond Conway, EBRD Resident Representative (see), Ms. Alison Cochrane, EITI Secretariat representative (see).

The representatives of NGOs from the US, Great Britain, Norway, Russia, Egypt, Nigeria, Peru, Camerun, Georgia, Kazakstan, Turkmenia and Kyrgyz Republic took part at the conference.

Note: The EITI London Conference March 17, 2005 established an IAG to guide the further work of the International EITI Secretariat on defining and refining proposals on the future of the EITI. IAG consists of senior representatives from countries implementing EITI, companies, NGOs, and donors. It is supported by a Secretariat based in the Department for International Development.