site.btaMore Voices Join Complaints about International Youth Forum in Sofia

Sofia, April 25 (BTA) - The youth organization of the opposition Movement for Rights and Freedoms (YMRF) Wednesday joined the complaints choir about the way Bulgaria handled a European YouthConference in Sofia. It took place on April 17-19 as one of theevents of the calendar of the Bulgarian Presidency of the EU
Council.

The forum has been in the centre of a bitter exchange between power holders and opposition for a couple of days now after the news media reported of complaints by a European Youth Forum official that young people were inadequately represented at the forum and that it was an out-of-the-book example of what youth participation is not.

The organizers have dismissed the criticism.

The YMRF said Wednesday that young people had the role of mere observers at the forum and that the delegates left the country with the sense that their ideas had been ignored, as had been issues they consider important.

They also said that the Bulgarian government had an attitude of indifference, which was emblematic of how it treats the problemsof young people.

Young people are a priority for the Bulgarian government on paper only but not in practice, the YMRF said.

In Parliament the same day, the Bulgarian Socialist Party urged the incumbents to apologize to young people who took part in theEuropean Youth Conference.

GERB representatives said that the forum was successful and had achieved a concrete result by mapping out 11 EU youth goals.

Meanwhile, the Youth and Sports Ministry publicized an official letter to Minister Kraseen Kralev from United Nations Population Fund Regional Director for Eastern Europe and Central Asia Alanna Armitage. The letter says that the conference in Sofia made considerable achievements and that the European youth goals formulated and agreed during the forum will bring tangible results for the young people in and outside the EU.