National Democratic Institute

Saputnik Film will be filming the conference of Europe and Eurasia Young Leaders, which will be held in Belgrade on December 5-9, 2007. Main task of the Saputnik Film film crew will be to cover all phases of the conference, the panels and the discussions between young leader and to interview them about "hot" issues in their countries.

Some background:

In 2005 and 2006, The National Democratic Institute (NDI) and the International Republican Institute (IRI), together with the American Council of Young Political Leaders (ACYPL) and sponsored by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), organized two large conferences for young political and civic leaders from Europe and Eurasia. Bringing together some 150 activists from 15 countries, these two events (Macedonia in 2005 and Moldova in 2006) focused on democratic development, campaign training, and improved communication skills.  

International Republican Institute

The conference in Macedonia resulted in a youth leadership communications network www.democraticyouth.net. The web portal currently features content from the 2005 and 2006 gatherings, examples of best practices from Europe and Eurasia, and successes from young leaders across the region. Since 2005, the site has been managed by ACYPL who will hand it over to a Balkan-based host organization (Youth Initiative for Human Rights – YIHR) following this seminar.

Eeypl

The third event of the series is again being organized by NDI and IRI, in cooperation with ACYPL and sponsored by USAID. Throughout the conference, a strong emphasis will be placed on the use of modern information and communication technologies to help young democratic leaders, many of them living in challenging environments, use the Internet and other on-line tools to build and sustain networks, design activities and projects and identify possible sources of financial support, and reach out to like-minded citizens.