On the 9th of May 1950, Robert Schuman presented his proposal on the creation of an organised Europe, indispensable to the maintenance of peaceful relations. Today the 9th of May, the “Europe Day”, has become a European symbol and the occasion for activities and festivities that bring Europe closer to its citizens and European peoples closer to one another.
The Local Democracy Agencies marked 9th of May by organising different public events in their local communities to help increase the level of information on different aspects of EU integration.
This year particular focus was on youth and EU active citizenship, while also during the week a wide range of cultural programmes promoting the co-operation links with EU counterparts was organised in the cities all across the Western Balkans. In Croatia – LDA Verteneglio, Sisak and Osijek organised cultural events gathering young people and volunteers, quiz for the secondary school students, public debates gathering citizens from all sections of local community.
Marking the Day of Europe has become a part of regular annual activities of the LDA-s in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in Serbia, taking place in Zavidovici, Mostar, Prijedor, Subotica and Nis.
During the week LDA Mostar organised a series of local events gathering citizens of diverse ethnic background to promote good local neighbors’ days, in Subotica a public round table on interculturalism and good governance took place and the public NGO fair organised with the support of EU Delegation in Serbia took place in the main city square.

A public debate on “Common heritage and Policy”, organised by the Veneto regional branch of the European Federalist Movement, in collaboration with ALDA, will take place Sunday, May 6 in Vicenza.
Water, air, energy, environment, landscape, health, education, must be considered “commons heritage”, not available for use of a part.
The management of this “common heritage” should be “personal and common,” alternative to private and public (individual Country or local authority) management.
After the introduction of Lucio Perosin, coordinator of the event, will intervene Giorgio Rivolta, professor of philosophy, Paolo Cacciari, journalist and political activist, and Matteo Roncarà, Secretary MFE Veneto.
The debate will take place at Pensionato Studenti – Residenza Universitaria “Madonna di Monte Berico”
Contrà San Marco 3 Vicenza.

Mrs. Antonella Valmorbida, ALDA Director and Coordinator of the Sub Group on Local Government and Public Administration Reform of the Civil Society Forum for Eastern Partnership, was one of the speakers at the meeting on “Public Administration reform in Eastern Partnership countries: how far, how deep?”.
The event has been organised by the EPC, European Policy Center, in Brussels (3rd of May 2012).
After the welcome speeches by Mr Eberhard Rhein, Senior Adviser, EPC, and Mr. Matti Maasikas, Permanent Representative of Estonia to the EU, other speakers were Mr. Alexei Sekarev, Project Manager, Estonian Centre of Eastern Partnership, Mr. Richard Tibbels, Head of Division for the Eastern Partnership, Regional Cooperation and OSCE, EEAS, and Mr. Keit Kasemets, Strategy Director, Government Office of Estonia.
The event was held under the auspices of the EPC’s Europe in the World programme, and has been organised in cooperation with the Permanent Representation of Estonia to the EU and the Estonian Center of Eastern Partnership.

More than 30 young people coming from 4 different European countries celebrated the “Earth Day” in Peja/Pec (Kosovo) with interactive actions in the main square of the City. Participants prepared leaflets with slogans concerning environment protection, alternative waste bins made from recycled materials and put in place a public flashmob.
All participants worn green t-shirts and distributed the leaflets with environmental protection slogans to local citizens.
ALDA, in cooperation with Tavolo Trentino con il Kossovo and LDA Kosovo, implemented the youth exchange “Earth Day” from 16 April till 22 April in Peja/Pec (Kosovo) in the framework of the European programme Youth in Action. The purpose was to make youngsters aware of the environmental issues in Kosovo and in their local communities and to define common strategies of action. The participants came to Kosovo to take part in this exchange from many countries in Europe: Italy, France, Serbia and Kosovo. The project finished on 22nd April with a public event celebrating the ”Earth Day” in the main square of Peja/Pec.

In the period of 25 and 26 April 2012, in Caen, the capital of the French Region Lower Normandy, the Coalition of youth organisations – SEGA and the House of Europe in Caen, will organise Study visit on the topic “Volunteerism as a factor for social cohesion”. The Macedonian delegation will be represented by one representative of youth organisation working with volunteers and one representative of Macedonian municipality.
During the visit, the Macedonian delegation will have an opportunity to meet with representatives from Lower Normandy organisations working with volunteers. Macedonian representatives will also visit governmental institutions and CSOs responsible for implementation of the programme Service Civique (Citizen Service).
This activity is part of the component: Youth, Local and European Citizenship within the Project for decentralised cooperation between Republic of Macedonia and the region of Lower Normandy – France, managed by ALDA, implemented by the Coalition of youth organisations SEGA – Macedonia and the European House of Caen – France.

A meeting of municipalities and communities from the Region of Lower Normandy who cooperate with the Macedonian municipalities will take place on April 25 in Caen. The meeting will gather the officials and representatives from the Lower Normandy communities, but also representatives of the Regional Council of Lower Normandy, as well as representatives of the organisation Horizons Solidaires and the representatives from ALDA Skopje office that are in charge of technical support for the cooperation of cities.
Participants will have the opportunity to discuss the progress of each municipality in the cooperation and will give an update on administrative and financial matters. They will also discuss the opportunities in establishing new links and introducing other municipalities in the cooperation. One part of the meeting will focus on the tourism component, as a part of the Decentralised cooperation between the Region Lower Normandy and Republic of Macedonia, and on the role of the municipalities from both regions in tourism development.
In the framework of the Decentralised cooperation between Lower Normandy and Macedonia, there are currently seven active town twining’s, and more pairings are planned in the future. The town twinning segment builds up contacts and friendship with communities from the two territories and promotes better understanding. The Programme for Decentralised cooperation is coordinated by ALDA.

The Union of Towns and Cities of Slovakia, in co-operation with ALDA and City Bratislava, organises InfoDay Europe for Citizens that take place in Bratislava, on the 21th of April, 2012, within the ALDA Project TIC-TAC – Training, Information, Cooperation – Towards Active Citizenship.
The event will be held in Primatial Palace, Primacialne nam. 1, from 8:00 to 18:00.
This InfoDay is the first local event organised within the project TIC-TAC and will be followed by eleven other similar initiatives taken by the other partners of this project.
The InfoDay will focus on the promotion of Europe for Citizens Program, history and the concept of Europe wide town-twinning initiatives; deepen knowledge about the concept of active citizenship and citizen’s participation in the European context.
The InfoDay create the platform for the meeting of local authorities and citizens that are interested in the field of active citizenship and in improving governance and relationships between citizens and municipal governments at all levels

On Saturday 14th April 2012 the first training session for young volunteers who want to become EU promoters in their community took place in the premises of the Local Democracy Agency in Osijek. The session is a part of the project which is financially supported by the City of Osijek and which aims at capacity building of young people who would like to volunteer in civil and public sector on the implementation of activities related to EU topics.
The introductory lecture entitled “EU basics” was held by Mr. Domagoj Hajdukovic, Member of the Croatian Parliament and a member of the Parliamentary Committee for Family, Youth and Sports. The lecture included a chronological history and development of the European Union, its enlargement process as well as its institutions and bodies.
In direct contact with the Croatian MP the young people had an opportunity to hear more about the political parties in the EU, about its common market, the EU integration programs and about challenges the EU is facing today.
In the informal discussion that followed the lecture the young participants were interested to find out more about “eurocrats”, Switzerland and Norway, which are not formal EU members as well as about the prospects of employment in the EU after the Croatian accession to full EU membership.

The partner meeting of LDA Georgia will take place in Strasbourg on 19th of April 2012. The meeting will be held by the Municipality of Strasbourg, lead partner of the LDA.

Its main objectives  will be the updating of LDA Georgia’s statute, the analysis of the situation regarding LDA partner’s network and the Action plan for 2012 – 2013.
The meeting will be opened by the  welcome speech of Mrs. Nawel Rafik-Elmrini, Vice Mayor of Strasbourg, Mrs. Antonella Valmorbida, ALDA Director and Mr. Ioseb Khakhaleishvili, Executive Director of LDA Georgia.

A group of five young people from Georgia, was not allowed to enter Kosovo for a Youth Exchange promoted by ALDA and Tavolo Trentino per il Kosovo, for unjustified reasons.
Alda is concerned for such an act which is affecting the sense of integration and friendship the Association is trying to disseminate among young people in South Eastern Europe and Neighbouring Countries. A letter of complaint from ALDA President, Mr. Per Vinther, and a local partner of our Youth in Action Initiative in Kosovo, was addressed to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Kosovo, Mr. Enver Hoxhaj, to the European Commissioner Fuele, to the Agency for Youth in Action and to the Secretary General of the Council of Europe.

The elections for the new Governing Board of ALDA will take place on 7th of June during the morning session of the ALDA General Assembly in Udine (I).
ALDA invites its members to consider their possible candidature on the new Board.
Deadline to submit candidatures is scheduled for the 11th of May 2012, following the indications included in the official invitation.
In the period between the deadline and the General Assembly all the candidates profile will be published on ALDA website.

On April 2, 2012 in the municipality of Veles (MK) the Macedonian partners of the Decentralised cooperation between Lower Normandy and Macedonia, met during Intermediate Steering Committee. This encounter followed the Steering Committee for French partners, held in Caen on the March 20, 2012.

Mrs. Nadège Lécluse, Head of international cooperation and mobility division of the Regional Council of Lower Normandy, together with Mr. Gallet, Attaché for cooperation at the Embassy of France in Macedonia, and Mr. Zafirovski, Councillor in the Ministry of Local Self-Government of Macedonia, co-chaired the meeting.
The partners were able to expand their general knowledge on the current political situation in France, as well as in the Region of Lower Normandy, which is very different from the political structure in Macedonia. They also had the opportunity to discuss about the important issues regarding the program of the Decentralised cooperation, the cooperation between municipalities and the previewed activities for the end of this year.
In the domain of communication, they were able to exchange on the logo and the new website of the cooperation.
This Steering Committee reaffirmed the engagement of the institutional partner, the Ministry of Local Self-Government of Macedonia, in particular in renewing the agreements of cooperation between the Region of Lower Normandy and Republic of Macedonia, previewed for next July. At this occasion Mr. Laurent Beauvais, the President of the Region of Lower Normandy will visit Macedonia and attend the Final Steering Committee, which will have more political than technical dimension.
The Programme for decentralised cooperation between the Region Lower Normandy and Republic of Macedonia is coordinated by ALDA.

Within the cooperation project between the Municipalities of Thiene (I) and Ijevan (AM), a study visit of a delegation of the Armenian City will be held in Thiene (10-13 April 2012).
Waste management, culture, territorial management, will be the areas of exchange of good practices among administrators and officials of the two municipalities.
(In the photo: First meeting between Thiene and Ijevan in Ijevan, October 2011).
The Armenian delegation will arrive today in Italy for an intensive session of work within the project launched by the Municipality of Thiene with the Municipality of Ijevan, in collaboration with ALDA, with the financial support of the Veneto Region in the context of decentralised cooperation for development programme.
During the visit there will be many opportunities to deeper the mutual knowledge between administrators and officials of the two municipalities, to share the decision making processes of the two Cities and their way to promote and support the good governance and the citizens’ participation.

On April 4-5 the partners of LDA Armenia held meeting at the Region of Rhone Alpes in Lyon. They met to discuss how to organise the future work of the LDA and its strategic and action plan. Furthermore the partners discussed the finalisation of the charter for the LDA, which is necessary to register the LDA in Armenia.
Seven out of the LDA’s eight partners listed below participated in the meeting.
It was stressed that the agency won’t operate as an ordinary NGO but will have a different focus especially through the international element it brings to its work, on the European level through ALDA and the international partners, and at the South Caucasus regional level through the close cooperation with LDA Georgia and other ALDA partner and member organisations.
Mrs. Véronique Moreira, The Vice-President of the Region Rhône-Alpes, Responsible for cooperation solidarity, also participated in the discussion of the work of the LDA as well as several cities and other organisations from Rhone Alpes who are working actively in Armenia.
Counterpart International supported the participation of Armenian partners to the meeting.
The LDA in Armenia was opened in October 2011. Partners of the LDA come from three countries: Region Rhône-Alpes (France), Region Friuli Venezia Giulia, (Italy), the Union of Communities of Armenia, the Urban Foundation for Sustainable Development (Armenia), the Journalists’ Club Asparez (Armenia), the Municipality of Gyumri (the host city in Armenia), Shirak Centre (Armenia) and International Center for Human Development (Armenia).
Gyumri is the second largest city in Armenia, situated in the North of the country and has been selected as host since it will provide a good basis to allow the LDA to work on a national level.

The international training session of the project TIC-TAC was a success since it allowed a fruitful exchange between the partners of the project, who were mostly represented.
The training session was held in the Liaison office of the Friuli Venezia Giulia Region in Brussels from 29th to 30th March.
The day before, the participants of the training session of TIC-TAC attended the international launching conference of another project led by ALDA: WTD-Working Together for Development.
This training was the first opportunity for partners of the project TIC-TAC to meet each other and to share their experience. The first part of the training was organised with a dynamic approach providing to participants both theoretical elements on the Europe for Citizens Programme and concrete examples from people who have already implemented a project within this programme.
Then participants were divided in working groups and tried to identify quality elements on active citizenship projects, which were synthesised and presented to them on the second day of the training.
Diego Pinto, General Secretary of the European Movement International came to present its organisation and to speak about a specific way of grant proposed by the Europe for Citizens Programme (operating grant).
These two days allowed to participants to increase their knowledge on the Europe for Citizens Programme, to discuss the preparation of the second step of the project TIC-TAC, which is the organisation by each partner of 12 local info-days aiming at promoting the Europe for citizens Programme. It was also an opportunity for participants to meet new organisations and new potential partners for further projects.

As part of the SolArid programme, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development of Algeria in partnership with the Global Mechanism of UNCCD, United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification, had co-organised an international workshop for the socio-economic development of tangible and intangible rural heritage in arid and semi-arid regions of Algeria. The workshop took place from 28 to 29 March 2012 in BouSaâda (Algeria).
Vice president of ALDA, Mr. Alessandro Perelli, attended to the workshop.
Beginning his speech, Mr. Perelli has launched an appeal for the release of Rossella Urru, Italian cooperator kidnapped and imprisoned for five months in southern Algeria, and of others cooperators in the same condition.
“The experience of Northern Italy –Mr. Perelli said in his speech – indicates that in order to make a quality leap in the development of agriculture, Algeria needs to engage the modernisation in its traditions. It is a challenge that Algerian people and its leaders have to face because development and modernisation of the agricultural sector does not mean only positive feedback for the economy, but also a practical and viable solution to the serious social problem of emigration”.
As part of its National Strategy for Sustainability and Rural Development, Algeria wants to improve social cohesion and development of rural areas to guarantee equal resources access and that decentralisation will result with special attention given to the most vulnerable rural populations. These objectives can be achieved only with an improvement in investment planning and if the geographical diversity is taken into account.
The strategy focuses on four programmes: rehabilitation of villages and “Ksours”, recovery and development of economic activities in rural development and natural resource protection, enhancement of tangible and intangible rural heritage. Each programme promotes partnerships between actors of development, multi-sectorial integration, support for the implementation of innovative economic activities, promotion and sustainable management of resources and heritage, socio-economic synergy and coordination in actions. These programmes all focus on development and revitalisation (economic, social, environmental and cultural) of the territories.
Through this strategy, Algeria pursues several objectives: reverse rural exodus, fight against desertification and erosion, widespread social, economic, cultural and environmental development in steppe, oasis and mountainous areas.
The workshop had the aim to contribute to the enhancement of tangible and intangible rural heritage, through the analysis of international instruments and programmes and the identification of a pilot partnership programme for the development of socio-economic activities on rural heritage promotion, together with local actors.