IUSY is ready to do its active part to facilitate the work of ngos and youth for the inclusion of refugees

20th April 201821st April 2018admin

Study session for an inclusive society for Refugees - Budapest - at the European Youth Center - 23/27 April 2018

The International Union of Socialist Youth is ready to welcome 22 participants from 18 countries to the European Youth Centre of the Council of Europe in Budapest for a 5-day Study session to empower youth in the hard work to create more open and fairer societies for refugees, from the 23rd to the 27th of April, 2018.

The Study session, organised by IUSY in cooperation with the Council of Europe, aims to facilitate the participants in exploring the roots of discrimination, empower them in their efforts to work with and for young refugees to help with the development of their full personality and their social inclusion.

Participants will explore the concepts of identity, discrimination, with a particular focus on refugees and Internally Displaced People.

Participants will be asked to share both their best and worst experiences from their home countries, in an effort to come up with an online platform that aims to help youth organisations to get in touch with NGOs and vice-versa. The aim of the platform is to improve the coordination in organising events at the local and national levels with the hopes to sensitise and engage their local communities in the active inclusion of refugees.

ZITA GURMAI – newly elected member of the Hungarian parliament and PES women President will open the Study Session on Monday – the 23rd of April, at 9:30 am.

Participants will be helped in their work by high-level speakers who will participate in a special Panel debate on Wednesday the 25th of April, at 11 am, focusing on the role of the different stakeholders in the field:

Marja Bijl – Vice-president of PES women (Party of European Socialists’ women network). Ms. Bijil is a managing director of an NGO working to combat human trafficking (a situation many refugees, both women and men face when they arrive in Europe). She is well known in her home country (The Netherlands) for the organisation of local-network to combat human trafficking;
Michaela Pobudova – Director of Mareena. Ms. Pobudova has a long history of working with refugees and migrants and is currently the director of Mareena. Mareena is a Slovakian NGO working for inclusion of newly arrived refugees and migrants through courses and workshops that facilitates the promotion of the full personality of people, helping them to not be “just refugees”;
Neil Arun – Journalist and Editorial consultant. Mr. Arun has been shortlisted twice for the European Press Prize. He has worked with local journalists in the Balkans and Iraq, specialising in investigative journalism. Mr. Arun has also been a mentor in the Refugee Journalism Project. Neil Arun has his work published on The Guardian, the New Statesman, The Atlantic, and The Independent among others.

The speakers will give participants an insight into the relationships between politics, civil society and journalism when it comes to working with and portraying the so-called “Refugee crisis”.

Contacts:
Amanda Lilliefeldt | IUSY Project Manager – amanda.lilliefeldt@iusy.org
Matteo Cervi | IUSY External consultant on communication – matteo.cervi@iusy.org

Report from the II Latin-American annual conference (Bogotá – Colombia)

27th March 201827th March 2018admin

Latin American annual conference of the Global Progressive forum - Empowering youth

Between Thursday the 22nd and Saturday the 24th of March the II Latin-American Annual Conference of the Global Progressive Forum was held in the city of Bogotá, hosted by the Liberal Party of Colombia, with the support of Party of European Socialists and Foundation for European Progressive Studies. The event was coordinated by Maria Cristina Cifuentes, IUSY former Vice-President, and Rodrigo Muñoz Baeza, IUSY Vice-President, took an active part in it.

During the conference, various debates and conversations were held on different topics: the peace agreements in Colombia, the European Union – Latin America and the Caribbean trade agreements, the situation of human right s in Latin America, the struggle for land in the continent, the gender perspective in the globalization, the LGTBI agenda in globalization and the empowerment of youth in access to politics.

IUSY participated within the framework of the panel on the struggle for land in Latin America (moderated by Rodrigo) and in the panel on the empowerment of youth in access to politics (moderated by Maria Cristina and with the participation of Rodrigo as one of the panellists).

We highlighted the work that has been done in IUSY regarding the political training of young people from various Countries around the world. We stressed the importance for Political Parties of working in cooperation with youth to make influential decisions for the development of our Countries. Young people can provide valuable knowledge and new action strategies to generate social transformations and common welfare.

International training activities such as those offered by IUSY (Seminars, Study visits, Political festivals, Regional committees meetings, Thematic workshops, among others) are efficient instruments to develop youth involvement at the local and national levels. If we participate we can understand the good practices that are developed in other Countries and we can put them in practice in ours.

The leaders of the political parties must value the knowledge acquired by the young people in the participation in international activities, and they must provide spaces for the presentation of innovative ideas which promote the creation of new policies and effective action strategies.

In this event three experiences were presented:

personal experience in the PS Chile,
political participation in general in Latin America (especially the alarming low participation in elections, the decrease confidence in democracy as a political system versus dictatorships, and the class bias in political participation)
and the empowerment of Youth in Mother parties (sure that through organization, contestation and attitude political spaces will open, taking as an example Jusos, the youth organisation of the Social-democratic party of Germany, and its strong position against the formation of a new government of great-coalition in their Country).

We also had a private meeting to discuss the political situation in Venezuela, in which the representatives of the parties Acción Democrática and Voluntad Popular, as well as the former Attorney general Luisa Ortega, were invited to report the institutional, humanitarian and economic crisis that the Country is experiencing.

In this occasion, and representing IUSY, pointing out the political positions of the Organisation through the statements of the IUSY American Committee (“We reiterate our concern about the political, economic and social crisis that deepens in Venezuela”) and of the IUSY Presidium, citing that “IUSY 1) calls for plural dialogue, and 2) we urge the main political actors of both the government and the opposition to the cessation of political violence. We also hope that 3) the institutions are respected and 4) that they bet on the recognition of all the Venezuelan people” and that “IUSY 1) requests the right to peaceful protest to be guaranteed and that 2) who has been deprived of liberty during the demonstrations can be judged by natural judges, and that they are guaranteed due processes and, finally, 3) the posts are released“, signing the study visit that was made in 2015 to Caracas.

Finally, we announced the intention to be present in Venezuela during the upcoming Presidential elections as observers.

Conclusions

The European Union has been working with effort in order to contribute to the important peace process in Colombia, providing significant support and accompaniment in the implementation of the agreements.
Relations between Europe and Latin America have been maximized to support solutions to different situations, as the case of Venezuela. There is a call for international cooperation to support the opposition in Venezuela.
We must continue to create effective action strategies that provide guarantees of rights for LGTBQI* people, women’s rights, gender equality, and the rights of indigenous communities.
We understand that in Latin America there are problems that require urgent solutions, and international cooperation provides solutions and advances, building justice, peace, freedom and equality.
IUSY should continue working with the Global Progressive Forum in the development of training projects to contribute with effective action strategies to solve the problems of the region.

Rodrigo Muñoz Baeza
IUSY Vice-President

Maria Cristina Cifuentes
Former IUSY Vice-President

Statement of the Progressive Alliance delegation visiting Malaysia

23rd March 201823rd March 2018admin

The seven members of the Progressive Alliance delegation (which IUSY was part of) that visited Malaysia

Download the Statement in PDF

Download the background paper on Malaysia

This is the statement of a seven-member delegation of the Progressive Alliance that visited Malaysia to assess and demonstrate solidarity in support of democratic processes in the run-up to the 2018 General Election.

The delegation attempted but failed to meet the Speaker of the Parliament of Malaysia, but was successful in meeting political leaders from several parties, leaders of civic organizations and visited communities in Kuala Lumpur (capital city of Malaysia).

The delegation included:

Giacomo Filibeck, Deputy Secretary-General, Party of European Socialist (PES)
Neena Gill, Member of European Parliament, Group of Socialists and Democrats (S&D Group)
Evin Incir, International Secretary, Swedish Social Democratic Party (SAP)
Greg Moran, Australian Labor International
Ana Pirtskhalava, Secretary-General, International Union of Socialist (IUSY)
Conny Reuter, Secretary General, SOLIDAR
Rainer Vogt, Progressive Alliance

We are concerned to learn from reports and discussions with Civil Society Organizations (CSOs), Nongovernmental Organizations (NGOs) active in Malaysia as well as various institutions, political and community leaders about the following issues:

Reports of disenfranchisement of opposition supporters through re-delineation and gerrymandering in favour of the ruling party of Malaysia, taking into account anticipated political allegiances and ethnicities. This includes the reported proposal to create 13 “Super constituencies” with over 100,000 voters each, mostly in opposition-held, non-Malay areas;
Concerns over mismanagement of voter records;
Reported tampering with voter registration;
Reported inaccessibility of electronic data of the draft supplementary electoral roll;
Concerns that expansion of postal voter categories may facilitate fraud;
Reports of infringements on freedom of assembly and association of Malaysian citizens and arrests, charges against and convictions of activists, artists, politicians, and non- affiliated citizens under draconian laws, as well as denial of legal status to opposition political parties;
Potential negative impact of high inequality and corruption on equal participation in elections;

In light of the above observations, we call on the Federal Government of Malaysia to ensure that the Election Commission adheres to due impartiality, there is no gerrymandering or malapportionment of electoral districts and that voter registration takes place in line with international standards. Respecting and upholding the social, human, civic, economic rights and advocacies of Civil Society Organisations, Nongovernmental Organisations, and organized groups goes to the core of free and fair elections; citizens of Malaysia need to be able to inform themselves about the general election and respect freedom of assembly, association and expression. It furthermore is vital that inclusive policies upholding the rights of all members of Malaysian society – regardless of gender, ethnicity, socioeconomic background, age and political affiliation – are institutionalized.

We encourage authorities of Malaysia to invite international electoral observation missions to ensure that democratic processes are improved upon and adhered to.

Any democratic elections must be nothing less than an enabling mechanism for its electorate to bring change. In view of the social, political and economic inequalities that are rife in Malaysia, far-reaching and wide-ranging institutional reforms must be front and centre of the next government’s agenda to ensure the economic inequalities, systemic flaws of governance, and a deficit of democratic rights are addressed for all Malaysians.

We, in the Progressive Alliance, are committed to closely monitoring the situation.

For democracy and social justice, the international community unites!

Promoting active citizenship and participation: a toolkit

Aside22nd March 201822nd March 2018admin

Download the toolkit in PDF

This toolkit is a collection of the methods, activities and project ideas of the international activity “Young people in action: promoting active citizenship and democracy” organized by the International Union of Socialist Youth (IUSY) with the support of Young European Socialists (YES).

The activity took place in June 2017 in Berlin and was hosted by SJD – Die Falken with the financial support of the European Youth Foundation (EYF). The activity gathered together 24 participants from 16 countries who worked together on the themes of democracy, active citizenship and youth participation.

After the activity, the team gathered the implemented methods as well as the ideas produced during the activity in this toolkit in order to share them with young people and youth organizations who work actively in the eld.

The toolkit presents selected methods implemented during the activity as well as ideas that have been created and developed by the participants. It also includes a short overview of non-formal education, active citizenship and youth participation. In this way, the toolkit introduces the main concepts of the activity and offers methods that can support exploring them while working with a group of young people. In the toolkit, you will also find the daily flow of the activity and several useful resources that will support you exploring the theme more in-depth.

Team and participants hope the reader enjoys the tool-kit and finds content applicable to her*him context.

Active Citizenship

is a term used to describe the involvement of individuals in public life which can take place at local, regional, national and international levels. Youth organisations should support young people, for them to explore and understand the concept of active citizenship and develop skills and competences in order to address and analyse issues concerning the theme as well as be empowered to come up with solutions.

Youth participation

is a process of achieving positive changes in young people’s lives and of building a better community and society. Means to achieve it are different: initiatives, activities, projects that promote youth involvement at very different levels–local, regional, national and international. There are diverse theories dealing with youth participation and it can be approached from different perspectives depending on the context, background etc. It is important to keep in mind the motivation of different actors such as civil society, political organizations, youth organizations might vary as well.

The team

Gohar Ghandilyan
(Armenia/Austria)

Anuschka Ruge
(Germany/Belgium)

James Sleep
(New Zealand/France)

Ana Pirtskhalava
(Georgia)

Matteo Cervi
(Italy/Austria)

Free and Quality Education as a Human Right (Students Working group meeting 2018)

20th March 201820th March 2018admin

What: Students Working group meeting 2018
When: from the 17th to the 20th May
Where: Kurt Löwenstein Youth Centre Werneuchen / Werftpfuhl, Germany. (Close to Berlin)
Participants profile: 18-35 years, grassroots activists, 2 seats for each region (no more than one per Member Organisation)
Deadline: 2 April

In this working group meeting, we will explore the today status of the access to education from a rights-based approach and will come up with campaigns to strengthen IUSY work on students issues.

Student politics remain critical in youth struggles for an equal world. IUSY as a youth organisation cannot afford to be complacent about student politics and struggles. It is therefore of supreme importance that the newly elected IUSY leadership takes the students issues seriously.

IUSY believes that student’s rights are fundamental for the youth of the world to become active and critical citizens in our society.

For the youth to realize its full potential and contribute positively towards development access to public education at all levels must be a reality.

Therefore we aim to build a network that will support the interest of students within IUSY structures and at a global level.

You can find here the complete Invitation and thecnical details

Participants profile:

We will select up to 2 participants from each Region. Each member organisation may register up to one participant for the meeting. Please note that the event must be gender-balanced and therefore the selection criteria will follow this premise in order to ensure such balance.

Participants must be able to attend the entire programme of the seminar and be active throughout the year after the meeting. This is due to that the work of the Working Group will be carried out throughout the year in line with the working plan.

It’s preferable that participants have experience in Students issues and are interested in human rights.

All participants must be aged 18-35 years old, with no exceptions.

Registrations:

Participants must apply by filling the online registration form at https://goo.gl/forms/kj3olrluKIquqnrr2 by Monday 2 April 2018.
All applicants will receive the outcome of their application by the 6th of April.

Contact:

Amanda Lilliefeldt
IUSY Project Manager
iusy@iusy.org
+4369913532970

EQUALITY STARTS WITH US: Apply for the Study session on promotion of inclusive societies and global citizenship in opposition to violent extremism

27th February 2018admin

Description of the Study Session

We think that a society can only be sustainable when it has reached the level of an inclusive, multicultural, peaceful democracy, respecting the rights and freedoms of all its citizens, with special attention to the most vulnerable groups. We are indeed convinced that it is the treatment of the weakest groups that shows the level of democracy and peace in a society. One of the groups who are suffering most from social exclusion, isolation and a general lack of acceptance are refugees, today in particular from the most recent escalations of conflicts in the Middle East.

Despite the disturbing discourse of hate-speech present in many European societies nowadays, the issues of refugees and migrants have triggered actions of solidarity among many citizens, especially the young people, and in many countries the civil society has not failed, whenever it had the possibility, to react in order to provide for their decent treatment. At official level, some of the states and local communities have shown a considerable level of solidarity, starting programs for inclusion of refugees (especially children and youth) into the society. However, others have shown an alarming level of rejection, which has sadly found support from some of their citizens. Based on this we are still aware of the need for a comprehensive response, both holistic in policy approach and global geographically, when it comes to this issue which is currently affecting hundreds of thousands of people, many of them youth and children.

Through this Study Session, we aim to empower the young people dedicated to contributing to the social inclusion of (young) refugees by letting them explore the issues and come up with their own responses to the current challenges on the one hand while, on the other, giving them the tools for advocating and motivating more young people for this action. To be able to do so, we will first offer the participants the opportunity to explore the concept of identity, its meaning, structure, bases on which it is formed and importance for a young person and their development from childhood to adulthood. Furthermore, they will have the chance to analyze the issues of discrimination and multiple discrimination, understand their roots and come up with their own responses and proposal for solutions, which they will be able to disseminate and use to call upon more young people to join them in this struggle.

In addition, we will give them the tools for exploring the concept of a peaceful, inclusive, democratic society and the ways in which they can reach out to all its stakeholders in order to contribute to bringing it upon, strengthening and keeping it.

Finally, as an international movement, we will offer the participants and youth organizations the possibility to work in cooperation with each other, across borders within regions and globally, in order to enrich their struggle and reinforce their efforts towards peaceful inclusive societies all over the world.

Objectives

Facilitate the participants in exploring the roots of discrimination and multiple discrimination and deconstructing them to develop means to promote social inclusion and human rights
Empower the participants in their efforts to work with and for young refugees to help with their personal development and social inclusion
Enable the participants to identify the main stakeholders in the society and develop their own methods and tools for reaching out to them to promote a peaceful, inclusive society and in particular the social inclusion of young refugees
Assist young people and youth organisations to establish a platform for intercultural learning and joint international action aiming at the struggle for peaceful inclusive society and against all forms of discrimination and violence.

Participants profile:

total of selected participants will be of 30 people

Grass root youth activists from IUSY Member and Partner Organisations – aged under 35 years old
Interested in the topics of human rights protection and create open and inclusive societies
Interested in developing follow up proposals on the topic

Working-language of the Study Session will be English: participants need to be able to communicate in English without translation in/to Spanish or in/to French.

The selection will take into account gender as well as geographical balance.
Participants must be able to attend the entire programme of the Study Session. All participants must be aged under 35 years old, with no exceptions.

How to apply

To make sure that everyone has equal chance in participating, participants must apply via the online application form at https://goo.gl/forms/7KoOhU6iFxZJ9vUG2.

DEADLINE for the registration is March the 9th, 2018 at 23:59 Central European Time. The final confirmation will be sent to all participants by Monday the 12th of March.

Eligible member/partner organisations per country

Are eligible to apply grassroots members from Member/Partner organisations from Member States of the Council of Europe (list: https://goo.gl/GbWVG1) and from the Parties to the European Cultural Convention (Belarus, the Holy See and Kazakhstan).

Participants from Countries outside Europe, especially in the Middle East, are encouraged to apply, and will be selected accordingly to their motivation and to the gender and geographical balances, taking in account the Council of Europe rule imposing strict limits for participants outside Europe.

Costs

Participation fee is set by the Council of Europe to 50 Euros. Travel, accommodation and food will be fully covered by the Council of Europe. Participation fee will be deducted from the Travel Reimbursement.

Travel information

Arrivals and Departures

Day of arrival for the Study Session is Sunday the 22nd of April and day of departure is the Saturday 28th of April. Please make your travel arrangements accordingly and do not forget that neither IUSY nor the Council of Europe will be able to cover accommodation or any other additional expenses for participants who need to stay additional nights. Participants wishing to stay extra-nights must organise themselves accordingly.

Travel reimbursement

As soon as your participation is confirmed, we strongly advise you to communicate with IUSY Secretariat in order to organise your travel and buy your tickets as early as possible to avoid high costs.

Cost of travels must be proven by original documents directly to the Council of Europe competent Secretariat for the Study Session. (Therefore, please do not forget to keep and hand in ALL of the following documents at the Study Session.)

Participants will be asked to present their tickets and receipts/invoices on the first day of the study session (original invoices, original receipts – in the case of e – tickets documentary evidence of the sum actually paid e.g. copy of credit card slip and to forward the original email with the e-tickets to traveldocs.eycb@coe.int – and copies of visas). Details of supporting evidence accepted by the Council of Europe are indicated in the attached file n. 1 “Travel Reimbursement documents required”. Travel Reimbursements will be issued by the Council of Europe, in CASH during the meeting. In case some documents are missing the reimbursement will be done via bank transfer.

Visas

The IUSY Secretariat will support visa applications for the Study Session. If you require a visa, please make sure to fill correctly the passport details (passport number, date and place of birth, date and place of issue and expiry) in the registration form.

The cost of the visa is reimbursed upon presentation of an original receipt and copy of the page in the participant’s passport containing the visa and the date of its validity. If the participant must travel to get the Visa, the cost of the travel or agency fee can only be reimbursed if the participant has contacted the Youth Department Secretariat of Council of Europe at Katalin.LERCH@coe.int. Supporting evidence must be provided. In any other cases the travel for the visa or the agency fee will not be reimbursed.

Accommodation and meeting venue

Accommodation and meals are provided at the European Youth Center in Budapest for the duration of the Study Session by the Council of Europe. The Study Session itself will be allocated in the rooms of the European Youth Center.

Contact

IUSY Secretariat – iusy@iusy.org / Phone-number: +43 699 135 32 970 or +43 699 135 32 960

#IUSYcongress2018: Membership applications

10th February 201817th February 2018admin

You may find below the Membership applications of the youth political organisations which applied to

become Observer Member of IUSY
become Full Member of IUSY
or be re-admitted to IUSY

The Membership applications will be discussed by the 33rd IUSY World Congress in Montenegro next weekend, on 16th and 17th of February.

The Congress will discussed total 29 Membership applications.

from Africa

OBSERVER MEMBER SEEKING FULL MEMBERSHIP

UESARIO – Western Sahara

ORGANISATIONS SEEKING RE-ADMISSIONS

ORGANISATIONS SEEKING OBSERVER MEMBERSHIP

from America

ORGANISATIONS SEEKING RE-ADMISSIONS

ORGANISATIONS SEEKING OBSERVER MEMBERSHIP

from Asia-Pacific

ORGANISATIONS SEEKING OBSERVER MEMBERSHIP

from Europe

OBSERVER MEMBERS SEEKING FULL MEMBERSHIP

ORGANISATIONS SEEKING OBSERVER MEMBERSHIP

from Mediterranean

ORGANISATION SEEKING OBSERVER MEMBERSHIP

#IUSYcongress2018 | Documents for the discussion

17th January 201817th February 2018admin

IUSY World Congress 2018 IUSY Congreso Mundial 2018 IUSY Congrés Mondial 2018

The IUSY World Congress 2018 is going to take place in Bečići, Montenegro, from 15th to 18th of February, 2018.

Please find below the documents (resolutions and working-documents) submitted for the discussion of the Congress.

More translations and documents are going to be uploaded on this page in the next days.

Emergency resolutions presented:

Emergency resolutions in English:

Emergency resolutions in Spanish:

Emergency resolutions in French:

Deadline for presenting Emergency Resolutions, Declarations, etc. it was FRIDAY, THE 16TH OF FEBRUARY, AT NOON, CONGRESS TIME.

Deadline for presenting amendments to Emergency Resolutions, Declarations, etc. is SATURDAY, THE 17TH OF FEBRUARY, AT 7AM, CONGRESS TIME at congress@iusy.org.

Please use this form to present your amendment to an Emergency Resolution.