Highlights of the European Youth Forum’s spring Council of Members
Brussels, April 2014 – The Council of Members and Extraordinary General Assembly of the European Youth Forum members – a total of 99 National Youth Councils (NYC) and International Non-Governmental Youth Organisations (INGYO) – took place on the 25th and 26th April in Brussels.
One of the main outcomes of the meeting was a Resolution on the situation in Ukraine which was adopted by all the members, voicing the demand of young Europeans throughout the continent for peace in the region and support mechanisms to end the conflicts. Representatives of both Ukrainian and Russian youth, together with young people’s representatives from other parts of Europe unanimously adopted the Resolution which will serve as a basis for the future advocacy of the Youth Forum on the issue. The tailoring of the resolution was preceded with a thematic square which OBESSU also took part in, representing the demands of school students. Read the Resolution on the YFJ website.
Furthermore, OBESSU contributed to discussions on youth policy in a global arena in two different settings – one during a thematic square on a permanent forum on youth to the United Nations hosted by Flemish Youth Council, and another one about the position paper by the Youth Forum’s Board on the Post-2015 agenda which features political demands in the spheres of education, employment, participation and inclusion.
As for the internal development of the Youth Forum, the platform elected a new Board member, Vasia Alexandri, from the Youth of the European People’s Party (YEPP) and a new Secretary General, Allan Pall. The new Secretary General has been an educational advocate mainly as a president of the European Students Union and has committed to highlight education as an important process in young people’s lives through his mandate.
Moreover, the Forum experienced a series of statutory changes developed previously by many of the members in a long consultative process, and has started consultations on the biannual Workplan 2015-2016 by forming a policy commission that OBESSU was also a part of.
The Youth Forum also organised a panel debate with candidates for the European parliamentary elections within the framework of the Love Youth Future campaign. Four candidates discussed many issues concerning the youth of Europe, such as youth unemployment or costs in and of education or even gender representation and balance in politics. The four panelists were:
- Sven Clement representing Pirate Party (Luxembourg)
- Philippe de Backer representing open VLD (ALDE) (Belgium)
- Sebastiaan den Bak representing CDA (EPP) (Netherlands)
- Amelia Womack representing Green Party (United Kingdom)
The next YFJ General Assembly will be held in Cluj, Romania in November 2014.
Written by Dasa Koribanicova & Dejan Bojanic
