On the 30^th of July during the peaceful demonstration of citizens there was arrested Coordinator of Working Group 4 “Contacts between People”, the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum (EaP CSF) Hovsep Khurshudyan.  Hovsep Khurshudyan implements very important work on the international level as a Coordinator of Working Group 4 and a member of The Steering Committee EaP CSF.  

West–East Bridges Foundation addressed Edward Nalbandian, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Armenia with a letter asking  the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Armenia to do everything possible for  Hovsep Khurshudyan’s release.

West–East Bridges Foundation under the frame of EaP CSF have successfully worked in Working Group 4 EaP CSF and actively cooperated with its Coordinator.  We consider that Hovsep Khurshudyan’s arrest will not help the Armenian authorities to solve political crisis in the country but also strongly hurts the international image of the country.

One of the  brick-set causes is the fact that the British people got tired of fighting with bulky and clumsy bureaucracy of the European Commission.   EaP Civil Society Forum is a great example of how a good idea could got stuck in a quagmire. We have already spoken about the   results of EaP CSF conference in Riga (http://www.west-east-fund.com/index.php/en/news/48-eastern-partnership-civil-society-forum-or-give-us-some-water-as-we-are-so-hungry-that-don-t-have-no-place-to-sleep). Unfortunately,  7th EaP CSFAnnual Assembly in Kyiv  developed more questions rather than provided the participants with answers. The main paradox is that The Steering Committee  EaP CSF has the same  authority as the Belorussian president Lukashenko.  Only the   Steering Committee  knows which EU organizations sent the application forms to participate in the next   EaP CSF Annual Assembly and only Steering Committee decides what organizations are to be accepted or rejected. EaP CSF National Platforms have the right to recommend the organizations representing their countries at the  EaP CSF Annual Assembly. We would like to remind  that the participation in EaP CSF Annual Assembly  gives the right for the organization to become a member of  EaP CSF. Thus, even though the EU organization got the membership of EaP CSF to receive the information about other EU members, addresses and e-mails in particular,  is impossible. This is a secret under lock and key. So, even when the EU Organization got the membership of  EaP CSF it is still very restricted in its opportunities to influence anything. Such organizations have

Youth unemployment is one of the most critical challenges the world is facing today: young people make up almost half of the world’s unemployed, despite accounting for only one quarter of the working population. Youth unemployment rates are historically four to five times more than the adult rates in every country in the world. In 2012, youth made up to 40% of the world unemployed. Close to 75 million youth were unemployed worldwide. The quality and relevance of education is often considered as the first root cause of youth unemployment. Yet, high education does not guarantee a decent job. One global survey found that more than 55% of employers worldwide believe there is a “skill crisis” as businesses witnesses a growing mismatch between the skills students learn in the education system and those required in the workplace.

As soon as the project was approved we started communications with partners. All the partners received the information that the project was approved and they can select the participants. The first edition of info-pack was distributed among the partners and future participants. The Application Form was created and sent to the partners for their participants to fill in. The form contained not only general questions, but some special parts that we needed for the project, like “What’s your definition of Democracy” and “Which session you can propose to conduct during the session?”. When the hotel was booked the partners and future participants received the second edition of info-pack containing more detailed information on how to get there, what the temperature will be, which clothes to take according to the weather and active games, what to bring for training sessions, intercultural party and other special activities. The info-pack also contained a small English-Georgian dictionary. When we knew more or less half of the participants, we started to panic about gender balance, as we had 2/3 of girls. We started to ask other partners, who did not send the information about their participants, to send us more boys, but they failed in this task, and we ended up with a group of 17 girls and 11 boys.