PODGORICA – Regional Youth Cooperation Office (RYCO) signed contracts on Tuesday with three civil society organizations and high schools from Montenegro that got the support to organize the first youth exchange programs within the RYCO Open Call for Project Proposals.
The representatives of the three organizations and high schools were addressed by RYCO Governing Board Member from Montenegro Mr Nenad Koprivica and RYCO Local Branch Officer in Montenegro Mr Edin Koljenović. The event took place in the Youth Centre in Podgorica.
Mr Koprivica congratulated the representatives of the awarded organizations and schools and pointed out that the regional partnerships built through the first RYCO Open Call for Project Proposals represent a true success. He stressed that the Government of Montenegro will stay committed in supporting RYCO in fulfilling its mission.
RYCO Local Branch Officer in Montenegro Mr Koljenović briefly presented the results of the Open Call and pointed out that, beside the three awarded organizations, there are twelve more organizations from Montenegro that will implement RYCO projects together with twelve organizations from the Western Balkans as partners which were also supported by RYCO. He said that the ambitious goals that RYCO has set at the beginning of its work are now fulfilled and underlined that the organization will continue working hard on brining the youth of the region together. Finally, he concluded that the partnerships between RYCO and the embassies of France and Germany and the OSCE Mission to Montenegro are highly important for the RYCO’s work.
RYCO believes that the exchange of experiences between young people from the region will help to form new ideas for the future of the region, contribute to the better understanding of human rights, initiate intraregional exchange and cooperation, and help foster trust building between youth from different ethnic groups. Throughout the first call for project proposals, RYCO aimed to provide necessary regional perspective and support a regional approach to continuous sector development in WB6. RYCO believes that only this is possible path to sustainable and peaceful development of the region.
The project proposals of the three organizations and secondary schools – NGO Alpha Centre, Centre for democracy and human rights (CEDEM) and Srednja Ekonomsko-Ugostiteljska Škola from Nikšić – were selected out of 28 applications from Montenegro which aimed to contribute to the process of reconciliation in the region of the Western Balkans through increasing youth mobility, cooperation and activism.
During the first open call for project proposals, RYCO received more than 420 applications from the Western Balkans which networked more than 1300 organizations and high schools form the region. The overall financial envelope for the call was 900.000 Euro.