RYCO in Serbia Reaffirms Its Support to Umbrella Youth Organizations from Western Balkans
As an introduction to the International Youth Day, celebrated on 12 August each year, the National Youth Council of Serbia (KOMS) organized a Regional Strategic Meeting in Belgrade on Thursday, 5 August 2021. During the meeting, six youth umbrella organizations from the Western Balkans signed a Memorandum of Partnership and Understanding (MoU).
Representatives of RYCO Local Branch Office in Serbia, Head of the Local Branch Office in Serbia Ms Ivana Antonijević and Local Program Officer Ms Bojana Zimonjić, participated in this meeting which was addressed by Ms Antonijević alongside the representatives of the Regional Cooperation Council (RCC) and the EU Delegation to Serbia. Ms Antonijević expressed her gratitude that RYCO was invited to the meeting and pointed out the readiness for closer collaboration between RYCO and youth umbrella organizations. “RYCO is committed to supporting other actors in regional collaboration and is happy to support initiatives such as this one,” the Head of the RYCO Local Branch Office in Serbia underlined.
She also emphasized the importance of close, strong and strategic collaboration of all six youth umbrella organizations and underlined RYCO’s strong support to their cooperation and local work with young people. “This support improves the conditions for the young people to become active change-makers in their society,” Ms Antonijević added.
The RYCO Local Branch Office in Serbia plans to organize a regional meeting of six RYCO Local Branch Offices, representatives of six youth umbrella organizations and Youth Representatives in the RYCO Governing Board aimed at empowering and encouraging youth umbrella organizations, as highest representative bodies of young people from the Western Balkans, to share their experiences, good pariticties and know-hows with each other and participate in the decision-making process in all respective Contracting Parties more actively.
“RYCO firmly stays committed to enabling a better environment for regional cooperation, beside other regional mechanisms such as RCC,” Ms Antonijević concluded.
The signed memorandum, which goal is to strengthen existing cooperation, communication and understanding between umbrella alliances, was signed by the National Youth Council of Serbia (KOMS), the National Youth Council of Macedonia (NMSM), the Youth Council of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (VMFBiH), the Youth Council of Brčko District (VSMBD), the Youth Council of Republika Srpska (OSRS) and the Youth Network of Montenegro (MMCG). The representative of Kosovar Youth Council participated in this meeting online.
The RYCO Local Branch Office in Serbia has already developed strong and tight collaboration with the National Youth Council of Serbia (KOMS) and is currently conducting a series of local events entitled “Meet your representatives. You (are) ask/ed! (Upoznaj svoje predstavnike. Ti (se) pitaš!)”.
Preuzeto sa: RYCO