Final Report - Seminar on Youth Policy in South-East Europe

Hans-Joachim Schild from the Partnership Secretariat presented the history of the Council of Europe’s involvement in the youth field. The CoE started to focus more closely on South East Europe (SEE) with the establishment of the Working Group on Young people within Working Table 1 of the Stability Pact for SEE. The CoE duly chaired the working group on “Education and Youth” under the “Democracy” Task Force. The main objective of this working group was to empower youth structures in the region and to motivate national governments to develop national action plans. The working group was established in 2000 and completed its work in September 2003. The CoE subsequently renewed its efforts in the SEE region in June 2005 with a Consultative Meeting on Youth Policy in South East Europe. The event, hosted in Sofia, was entitled “Reconstructing Youth in South East Europe - Recognition, Identity, Access and Inclusion”. This was followed in June 2006 by a similar event in Athens (Consultative Meeting on “Youth Policy Development in South East Europe”). The recommendations that emerged from the latter meeting included: • The need for training coalitions in the field of youth. • The need for the creation of a youth policy development centre. • Regional actions should be developed in the context of the Council of Europe’s ‘All Different - All Equal’ Campaign. • The need to strengthen SEE involvement in the working and decision-making structures of the Partnership.