In the framework of the component 3 regarding the protection and inventory of architectural heritage, starting from 25th June until 2nd July, the activities will continue through a study visit to North Macedonia.
The French delegation from the The National Association of Towns and Regions of Art and History and tows with protected areas will spend several days working on cities and protected areas with The Association of historical and artistic cities of the Republic of North Macedonia.

The two partners will prepare detailed plans for cities and protected areas in the municipalities of Veles, Kumanovo, Berovo, Stip and Kratovo. French experts will go on field and observe the conditions for the protection of architectural heritage, where they will define the priorities in this domain. The first detailed plans for protected areas will serve to plan and prepare the protection of architectural heritage at local level.
This stage of the project includes meetings with institutional representatives following the visit and conference held last February in Veles.

This visit is part of the Project for Decentralised Cooperation between Lower Normandy and North Macedonia, in the component 3 – Inventory of Cultural Heritage. The project is coordinated by the Association of local democracy agencies (ALDA). For further information please consult the webpage of the Cooperation http://crbn-mk.courriers.info/

The Mayor of Niš, Mr Miloš Simonović, visited yesterday (23rd of June) the ALDA office in Brussels which is hosting the newly established Representative Office of the City of Niš.
Dr. Alexandra Lugovic who is in charge of that office will be the eyes and ears of Niš in Brussels presenting what Niš has to offer potential partners and inversely looking for opportunities and contacts from which Niš can benefit.
The Mayor and his associates were welcomed by MrPer Vinther, ALDA President, and ALDA staff and spent time in the office discussing the potential for strengthening the co-operation between Niš and ALDA as well as between the City and the Local Democracy Agency for Central and Southern Serbia, which has been hosted by Niš for a number of years.
The visit was preceded by a well-attended reception the evening before, putting the Representative Office and the City of Niš clearly on the radar screen in the EU Capital.

Closing conference and Diploma Ceremony marked the end of year and a half long project Economy & Management for NGOs in Serbia, funded by SLOVAKIAD and realised in partnership with Education Center for Non-Profit Organisation – CVNO, BanskaBystrica, Slovakia, the Faculty of Economy ”MatejBel” in Banska Bystrica and the Faculty of Economy in Nis.

The project aimed at raising the capacities of Serbian NGOs to deal with their own management and financial resources. Representatives of 10 NGOs from the southern part of Serbia took part in 6 on line courses led by the professors from the Faculty of Economy Nis: Management of NGO, Marketing of NGO, Global economy, Human resources, Finances of NGO and New trends in NGO. These on-line courses will now serve as a module for possible future accredited master’s programmes on one of the universities in Serbia.
We are also pleased to say that, through this project, LDA initiated cooperation between faculties of economy in BanskaBystrica and Nis.

Within the project « Support to Further Implementation of Local Administration Reform in Turkey Project (LAR Phase II) », ALDA’s Cooperation Office of Brindisi involved Brindisi Municipality as member of a partnership among European towns.

In the same framework, on 15 and 16 June 2011, Brindisi Municipality will host a delegation of Turkish Municipalities to implement an exchange of best relationships / business practices and to open the way to possible commercial and industrial relations with the Turkish territory.
ALDA and Brindisi Municipality are operating partners of the project LAR Phase II « Support to Further Implementation of Local Administration Reform in Turkey » (http://www.lar.org.tr/), which is sponsored by UNDP-Turkey. It has the general aim of ensuring an effective, transparent, inclusive and participatory role of Local Government in Turkey (within the strategic decisions brought forward by the European Union, and specifically through a full implementation of the new legislation adopted in Turkey during 2003 – 2005).

On June 15-2011 at Palazzo Guerrieri, starting at 09.00 after the Mayor Domenico Mennitti’s greetings to the delegation of Turkish Municipalities, a number of thematic meetings that will address the following topics will be performed:

1. Local economic development: concerning ports and management of the shipyards, fisheries, promotion of trade, urban regeneration and employment, environmental protection, economic transformation of towns across their transition phase from agriculture to third sector.
2. Culture and Tourism: promotion of tourism, festivals’ organisation, renovation of historical and cultural sites, youth activities;
3. Social projects: women’s employment, child care, citizen’s participation, cultural and educational initiatives;
4. Municipal Capacity Building: e-municipality, exchange of visits between municipal staffs, organisation of training programs (for fire brigades, for environmental services and waste collection, for sewage, for urban planning, for public transports, for municipal police, for local planners, for GIS’s technologies);
5. EU funds and Project Management;
6. Practices of urban regeneration.

On June 15-2011 at Chamber of Commerce of Brindisi, starting at 15.00, a meeting with local entrepreneurs will be organised. Sponsored by ALDA and the local International Cooperation Department, this meeting aims to show Brindisi’s production/business sectors and excellences to the Turkish operators. The companies will be allowed to show their products and/or productions.

Participation in the workshop is free of charge and open to all entrepreneurs from Brindisi district.
June 16-2011 will begin at 9:00 and will be entirely dedicated to visiting some important/strategic public offices such as the Port Authority, the police headquarters and the Fire Department’s barracks.

For more information contact ALDA International Cooperation Department (via Guerrieri 7 – brindisi@aldaintranet.org | Tel: 0831/229423 – Fax: 0831/229222) or visit Brindisi Municipality’s website (http://www.comune.brindisi.it/web/comunicati-stampa/165-comunicati-stampa/308-progetto-lar-ii-il-15- and-the-16th-June-at-the-town-of-a-toast-delegation-of-representatives-of-institutional-turkey-will meet-the-business-locali.html ), or visit the websites of the participating Turkish municipalities: KARADENIZ EREGLI http://www.kdzeregli.bel.tr and ZONGULDAK http://www.zonguldak.com

All citizens are invited to attend.

The General Assembly 2011 of ALDA will take place in Bydgoszcz (Poland) on the 9th of July 2011.
“This meeting is essential to the life of our organisation and to discuss our future plans” stated Mrs Antonella Valmorbida, Director of ALDA.
During the Assembly will be revise and discuss the vision of ALDA’s Members on the role and objectives of the Association for the year 2020, in the future European perspective.
“We are very happy stated Mr Per Vinther, ALDA President- to accept the invitation of the City of Bydgoszcz, active member of the Association and in the Governing Board, to host the event. It gives us a special motivation since we are also matching the event with the launch of the Polish Presidency of the European Union”.
The general assembly will be preceded, the 8th of July, by an international conference on “Volunteering for Democracy” to be attended by about 150 representatives from civil society groups and local governments from all over Europe.

Members of ALDA and other experts and activists will identify the best practices and the methodologies to increase the democratic standards of our communities, also through the active involvement of volunteers. The issue is included in the Annual Priority of the European Union and of the Programme Europe for Citizens, thanks to which the Association of the Local Democracy is organising the event. The event will include formal and non-formal participation, with the possibility to express a plan for the future engagement of civil society in Europe in the field of voluntarism. Several projects will be presented as best practices and analysed as possible facilitators of democratic and participative processes. The polish civil society will be closely associated to the event.

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Useful material:

Bydgoszcz Conference-Programme PL
ALDA rapport trésorier 2011 FR
ALDA Programme 2011
ALDA Minutes General Assembly 2010 FR
ALDA Minutes General assembly 2010 EN
ALDA Moral Report 2010
ALDA Accounts 2010

We, participants of the First Working Group on Democracy, Good Governance and Stability of the EaP Civil Society Forum deeply regret the events that took place in the capital of Georgia on 26th of May, when riot police violently dispersed largely peaceful demonstration using excessive force. The violence resulted in the loss of human lives, many demonstrators have been injured, some disappeared and dozens have been arrested.

According to the reports of the domestic and international human rights organisations, police pursued fleeing demonstrators, kicking and beating many, using rubber truncheons. In one case, they chased down demonstrators who had taken shelter in a nearby cinema, detaining them and kicking and beating many as they exited.
Though under the Georgian legislation, the demonstration was unauthorised, nothing can justify prohibited ill-treatment of demonstrators.
We call on the Government of Georgia to launch an immediate, thorough, and impartial investigation into excessive and disproportionate use of force and hold those responsible accountable.
We request from authorities to restrain from politically motivated detentions and unlawful pressure on opposition activists.
We also call upon all political actors and society to restrain from any kind of violence, preserve public accord and promote reconciliation.
We call on the EU to request an independent investigation and monitor the actions taken to safeguard against future human rights violations, and to express its concerns directly to the Georgian government.

Center for Economic and Social Development (CESD) with support of European Commission and Management Center of Cyprus, held International Civil Society Forum in Baku, Azerbaijan on May 19th, 2011 with participation of representatives of civil society institutes, state agencies, international community, embassies, mass-media and academia.

Vugar Bayramov, chairman of CESD, opened International Forum and he mentioned that the main purpose of the event to analysis problems civil society institutes face now in Azerbaijan as well as to promote public-private dialogue.
Azay Guliyev, head of State NGO Council under President of Azerbaijan spoke about State Council’s activities and said that the government welcomes such initiatives. Antonella Valmorbida, co-chairman of EaP Civil Society Forum, spoke about European approach to civil society development and democratic values. Ovidiu Naftanalia and Fuad Huseynov, representatives of the Delegation of European Union to Baku, addressed EC support civil society in Azerbaijan. Mr. Bulent Kanol, Director of The Management Centre of the Mediterranean, Cyprus presented their activities related to civil society development in Azerbaijan.
Different panels were organised with participation local and foreign experts after the opening ceremony.

In Palermo, and with the presence of more than 200 participants, Region Sicily confirmed its leadership of the process called UNITED IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. The initiative was launched last year and it is now recalled to further promote the relationship in the Mediterranean area, from Morocco to Middle East, including, Spain, France, Greece, Italy and the whole Adriatic coast.

The project aims at valorising the contacts and experience of cooperation between this large area and to give a special leadership to local authorities and civil society. « Indeed, only through engagement of local authorities in the process, peace and development will be able flourish in this part of the world », confirmed M. Lombardo, President of the Region Sicily.
ALDA was present with its Director, Mrs Antonella Valmorbida, who took the floor in the panel dedicated to networks of local authorities and civil society, sitting next to CRMP and COPPEM. “The presence of ALDA in Sicily, active member of our association, is part of our strategy on the MED area where we are convinced our support in terms of local governance and citizens’ participation is of particular need and importance” stated Mrs Valmorbida.
ALDA engaged also many of its contacts and members in the process: in particular the city of Patras (Greece), the Association of Municipalities of Albania and the city of Kotor (in Montenegro).
The event was also dedicated to the delivery of the price AL Idrissi, for those who worked actively for peace and democracy in the MED area. A special recognition was awarded to the former trade unionist and President of Poland, M Lech Walesa.

On 2 May 2011 the host city of LDA Georgia, Kutaisi, celebrated its annual Day of the City. On this occasion ALDA was represented by the President, Per Vinther, accompanied by Ioseb Khakhaleishvili, Director of LDA Georgia. In his address to a well-attended ceremonial session the President commended the city administration for the excellent cooperation with ALDA since 2004 in the context of establishing LDA Georgia – in spite of frequent changes of mayor.

He recalled the objective of the LDA of helping local government and civil society work jointly to provide a better and more just community for all its citizens. Also, he informed the audience of ALDA’s plans to use LDA Georgia, which has worked successfully for five years, as a stepping stone for establishing in the shorter term LDAs also in Armenia and Azerbaijan thereby creating an LDA network across the region similar to the one in South East Europe

« There is no democracy without local democracy”. It is what said Ambassador Constantin Yerocostopoulos, Head of the Council of Europe office in Azerbaijan, opening the workshop held by ALDA in Baku, Azerbaijan, on May 17, on the development of local government and good governance at the local level.
This is the reason for which NGOs in Azerbaijan calls on the Congress of Council of Europe for moral support in their struggle and efforts to push for reforms towards a system of real local self-government in Azerbaijan.
At the workshop participants discussed the experience of local government reform in Bulgaria and compared it with the situation in Azerbaijan.

The Ambassador Constantin Yerocostopoulos spoke about the Council of Europe and the Congress’ initiatives in Azerbaijan and also mentioned the Congress’ recent observation report for Azerbaijan’s local elections that took place in December 2009. The report concluded that despite some technical improvements the elections were lacking the essence of real political competition and democracy.
Mrs. Antonella Valmorbida, ALDA Director told about ALDA’s work in South Caucasus and plans to open a Local Democracy Agency in Azerbaijan in the future. Mrs. Ginka Tchavdarova, Executive Director of the National association of municipalities in Bulgaria spoke about the experience and challenges Bulgaria has faced to develop local self-government and promote citizen participation at the local level.

Mr. Abil Bayramov from the NGO Alliance for Municipality Development spoke about citizen participation in Azerbaijan and the difficulties to talk about any form of real citizen participation, when the elected local government practically doesn’t have any power or money to work with. However, it was stressed that there is a huge potential in the population for more citizen participation and that any activity that allows for even superficial citizen participation is still useful and is giving an important example.
There were very active discussions throughout the workshop, especially on the question of how to overcome the situation that exists today with very limited powers to the municipalities and which role the Congress of the Council of Europe could play in supporting the NGOs’ efforts to push for reform of this system. The participants expressed hope that the monitoring report for Azerbaijan that the Congress expects to conduct in 2012 will bring focus on the fact that Azerbaijan hardly has reformed or strengthened its local self -government system since ratifying the Charter of Local self government in 2002.
One participant even stated that in fact the municipalities in the Soviet system had more powers than municipalities have in the current system in Azerbaijan. This might be an exaggeration but the fact is that local self-government practically doesn’t exist in Azerbaijan.

After a municipal reform in 2009 there are now 1718 municipalities in Azerbaijan. However, these municipalities have very limited authority and almost no money to work with.
The “Executive Committees” that are appointed directly by the president of Azerbaijan have the real power at the local level and the municipalities depend completely on these Executive Committees. The Executive Committees have much broader responsibilities than the municipalities and some of their responsibilities overlap those of the municipalities, which creates confusion – and leaves the municipalities with an unclear mandate.
The city councils are directly elected, but without any real authority these elections have limited meaning. The budget of the municipalities is around 4 Euro per citizen per year putting strong constraints on the possibilities for the municipalities to do anything.

The municipalities’ actual responsibility is limited to maintaining municipal roads, providing social support to low income groups who are not included in the state’s social programs, maintaining cemeteries and organising mourning ceremonies. Most municipalities still don’t have administrative buildings.
There aren’t any indications that the government in Azerbaijan is intending to reform this system substantially in the coming period. The Associations of Local Authorities in Azerbaijan and the Ministry of Justice, responsible for the municipalities, were invited to the seminar but didn’t participate.
The seminar was a reminder for ALDA of the extreme limits to local self-government in Azerbaijan and how far Azerbaijan is from meeting its commitments to the Charter of Local self-government. At the same time the seminar once again showed that there are very competent organisations and persons in Azerbaijan who are committed to the development of local self-government and needs the support of ALDA, the Congress and other international partners to achieve their goals.

The workshop is part of an ALDA project on support to Local Democracy in South Caucasus funded by the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities. It served as a follow up to the conference on cooperation for Local Government development in South Caucasus that took place in Kutaisi in November 2010. In April a similar workshop took place in Georgia and in July a workshop will take place in Armenia. The workshop was also partly funded by the and the Principality of Liechtenstein and its project to support the setting up of an LDA in Azerbaijan.