This speech represents the common effort of many supporters and partners of the project, from which I would like to mention the Romanian Council for Youth and Oricum Association. Thank you all and I hope you like our intervention at the UN. Here it is:

“Madam Chair and honorable Delegates,

200 million youth live with less than 1$/ day, of the 130 million illiterate people in the world nearly 60 per cent are young women; youth also make up 44 per cent of the total unemployed population, although they represent 25 per cent of the working age population and I cannot be but grateful to have the opportunity to be here and to present an overview of our ideals, honest thoughts and proposals for joining our efforts in building up a better world.

The progress achieved so far has a main role in our development process, yet the fight is far to be concluded. Taking into account the present global perspectives young people face new challenges and it is our moral obligation to cooperate, especially now when youth are voicing their concerns whilst they keep facing new risks.

Social inclusion, equal rights and opportunities for everyone are no less than links in the chain of sustainable development without which the circle cannot be completed. Young people are now actively and enthusiastically playing the role of the main engine for development. We are the base of the pyramid of social development and we proudly accept this position with great responsibility, but in order to meet our full potential and fulfill our responsibility we need that all youth are given an equal chance to take part in the process.

Young women and girls, young people in the rural areas and all other categories that are now isolated or prevented from participating in any form to the decision making processes or to enjoy the opportunities offered by our society, they must be included and society must take full advantage their potential.    

“The World Program of Action for Youth to the Year 2000 and beyond” is the tool for setting out goals and targets aimed to achieving an international agreement on youth and their sustainable development. The major 3 clusters represent areas where urgent action is needed. With this tool at hand and with the support of the United Nations system, member states have now the opportunity to develop and explore the full potential of world’s youth.

The international efforts to advance social integration of youth have largely expanded, but the risk factors for social exclusion of this age segment still call for policies aimed to combating discrimination, marginalization or other forms of exclusion.

Madam Chair,

In the present stage of globalization I would like to point out the urgent need for action in these main fields under the generous scope of “a society for all” concept.

Greater levels of economic insecurity as well as levels of inequality can generate disasters for young people, also leading to delinquency, illiteracy and some of the worst forms of violence. We need to decrease the level of unemployment and underemployment, and ensure a decent work for all. Deliver social dialogue and sustainable social programs for youth, in the context of a better social integration, should be seen as a must.

The situation is gradually improving, but we still have to pay attention to the differences between urban and rural areas, where young people face major difficulties in attending schools or finding appropriate jobs. The uneven economic growth, inadequate infrastructure and retrograde mentalities are all components of a greater exclusion of youth.

Among other essential points related to social integration, we proposed goals for all chapters and we seek to maintain them accountable and measurable for having the possibility to mainstream the role of youth in the decision making, in shaping policies and actively participating in the life of communities at all levels: local, regional, national and international.

Romania has made a great progress in the past years and the youth segment had been fully recognized as one of the main stakeholders of a modern dynamic society. Our voice and vision are more and more taken into consideration due to a much better organized and collaborative environment at local, regional and national levels.  

Empowering youth, promoting a value-based vision, training youth leaders, adapting to the new transformations, raising awareness on the international context are instruments for integrating young people in our societies and enabling them to assume an active role in taking responsible decisions for their future.

We are proud to be part of this generation where young people and the elder generation can sit at the same table, working together on shaping the future.

However, a lot more needs to be done and this progress would prove to be pointless unless implemented at a global scale.

Thank you Madam Chair

Alexandra Martin & Bogdan Covaliu

United Nations Youth Delegates of Romania“

After spending 20 hours in the Milan airport because of bad weather, we started working with our Mission and other youth delegates at the draft for the resolution on youth that you will all have the opportunity to see soon. Although not many countries decided to send youth delegates for the CSocD, we are all very enthusiast and restless. The new resolution on youth has brought a lot of interest from all of the member states and the negotiations are quite hard on this matter.

Me and Alexandra have prepared a speech for today’s plenary session regarding youth participation and social integration, and we will post the speech as soon as we’re going to deliver it.

Otherwise, it is very cold in New York, but since we haven’t had the time for anything else besides the CScoD and the work at the Romanian Mission we couldn’t care less for the weather. We do hope that it’s going to be a lot warmer in the weekend.

I’ll try to keep you posted with everything.

The reason I’m writing this is to give you a broad perspective on the way things work around here. In order to have a proposal passed by the General Assembly it is best to pass it first through the European Union coordination meetings, in order to have a stronger voice and our proposals to be supported by all the 27 member states and the candidate countries for the EU. However, all the EU member states have similar views in general over development and the steps that need to be taken for solving global issues, so our work is basically reduced to coordinating our efforts than to negotiating our proposals.

Yesterday I took part at a very interesting side-event with the topic focused on the death penalty and the UN’s last year’s resolution with the recommendation to the member states to abolish this form of punishment for all types of crime. In the panel of speakers we had the opportunity to listen the testimonials of 3 ex-judges and prosecutors from Japan and United States that are responsible for the prosecution and execution of more than one person, and that are now conducting a large scale campaign against this form of punishment, because in their experience it seems that many mistakes have been made and many innocent people have died.

The most important event that marked our week was the youth delegates side event “Do not sever your lifeline!
Why involving young people is crucial for development, especially in achieving the MDGs, and how to engage them.” It was an one hour and a half side event, entirely organized by the youth delegates, in which we discussed the importance of involving youth into the fight to achieve the MDG’s and different ways and examples in which we can inform and implicate young people into this process.

Beside the general discusions on the topic, we had some scheduled interventions from H.E. Frank Majoor -  Permanent Representative of the Kingdom Netherlands, Mr. Salil Shetty - Director of the Millennium Campaign, Mrs. Laura Laski - Coordinator Adolescent and Youth Cluster, UNFPA, Mrs. Fraziska Steel - Director Global Youth Action Network and two statements from the youth delegates of Thailand and Jamaica.

The event ended with the wonderful performance of the poet Aja‐Monet Bacquie.

I would also like to once more express my appreciation towards the Romanian Permanent Mission at the United Nations, whose representatives showed a great interest and support for this event - Amb. Simona-Mirela Miculescu, Mr. Traian FILIP - Minister Counsellor, Deputy Permanent Representative and our SUPERvisor for this General Assembly - Mr. Alexandru CIOROBEA - Third Secretary.

Unfortunately, we are experiencing some technical difficulties with attaching pictures to our posts, but I’m going to get back to you with some photos as well, shortly.

Since this is my personal blog :-p, I’m ataching my original speech, as it was meant to be, and you can all read our common speech on the unyouthdelegate.ro and on the unyouthdelegates.org websites, where it will be uploaded shortly.

Here it goes:

“    Mr. Chairman and honorable delegates,

A lot of people travel many miles to find the end of the world. As we all know, the world is round and the end is fortunately nowhere to be found, but now, we can all say that the world as we know it, has a top, and that top of the world in 2008 is in a symbolic way represented by the United Nations - a place where the entire humanity gathers and works together for achieving the goals that they have themselves agreed upon.
It is both an honor and a privilege to be here today and represent the voice of young Romanian people at the General Assembly of the United Nations. However, looking back to my life in Romania, the country where I was born and raised, a find myself and my fellow friends to be in a very fortunate position by being able to complete our education, to benefit from health assistance and health related programs, to vote and stand for in elections, to be able to walk without fear on the streets, to freely express our opinion in public. We take all these for granted!
Despite all this, Romanians are only 0.1 % of the world’s population and although many things need to be changed at our national level as well, I sadly discover everyday that at a worldwide scale things are not quite as fortunate as back home.
Although the increase in efforts to educate young people may seem a financial burden to many governments, this is, in my personal opinion, the best way to approach and break the vicious circle that we’re spinning in.
Making education available and affordable for all will not only result in a population that will produce more for the society, leading to a social and economic growth, but will also lead to a healthier, more aware population that will be able to protect themselves against  diseases like AIDS or Tuberculosis.
One of the major problems that derives from incomplete education, is related to the difficulties young people have in the field of work, most of them having problems in finding a job that best suits their needs and previous training. Local and national work markets are now becoming international work markets, resulting in the necessity of finding universal solutions to these problems. Many governments are forced to put their poverty, diseases, ethnic and religious conflicts first on the agenda when it comes to tackling the employment issue. In these countries, and not only, NGOs are doing significant efforts to ensure that education and its direct results on employment remain a national priority on the political agenda. NGOs and their volunteers are now playing a major role in achieving the development goals, but in order to ensure continuity, and to make their goals a reality, their work must be backed up by legislative and fiscal policies, that need to focus on youth, the most vulnerable category in the labor market.
Cooperation between the public and private sector (both businesses and NGOs)  is a must, when it comes to youth development. Encouraging self employment, education and training through volunteering, adapting the curricula to the market’s needs and supporting entrepreneurship should be on the focus of all youth aimed policies.
Today’s youth are tomorrow’s leaders! Let’s give young people a chance to achieve their full potential, to educate themselves, to protect their rights, to actively participate in the decision making process at all levels, and last but not the least, let’s give young people the chance to choose.
We already have the framework, we have the capacity, we have the human resources and we have the financial background to support our actions in achieving our goals. All we need to do, is to open our minds and souls, work together as a whole and get things done.
In 2015, some of us might no longer have the privilege to look back on our actions, some of us will still struggle to make the world a better place and some of us will be in this room amazed by the huge step that humanity took forward, by accepting and assuming the MDGs. Either way, in 2015 I’d like to be able to tell my children that we did our best for the world that they are living in.

Thank you Mr. Chairman “

Daca veniti pentru prima data in Cluj, sau chiar daca ati mai fost, dar nu ati apucat sa gustati putin din istoria si frumusetea acestui oras va recomand cu caldura acest centru, situat pe Bulevardul Eroilor nr. 6-8, mai ales ca toate facilitatile oferite sunt gratuite.

O initiativa laudabila a primariei Cluj-Napoca pe care sper sa o vedem copiata in cat mai multe orase din tara.

Toata intalnirea s-a axat in jurul meu si al Alexandrei, si le multumesc Corinei, Biancai, Dariei si lui Andrei pentru tot suportul pe care ni l-au acordat in acest weekend.

Dupa un curs intensiv despre modul de functionare a mecanismelor ONU, am discutat prerogativele noastre in acest mandat, despre care va voi mai multe detalii imediat ce terminam de editat tot materialul, precum si despre relatia noastra cu institutiile statului si cu tinerii romani de pretutindeni.

Intalnirea a culminat duminica cu o mica “masa rotunda” cu alti tineri deosebit de inteligenti si entuziasti, reprezentanti ai unor organizatii studentesti din Cluj-Napoca. Am pus bazele unui grup de discutii pe care va invit sa intrati, in cazul in care va intereseaza problematica ONU si am analizat impreuna problemele intampinate de tinerii romani in ceea ce priveste gasirea unui loc de munca si migrarea tinerilor spre alte tari - teme pe care eu si Alexandra le vom dezbate si la New York in toamna, in cadrul Adunarii Generale a ONU.

Adresa grupului este tineri_la_onu@googlegroups.com si va invitam sa aderati la el si sa dezbatem impreuna toate problemele care ne intereseaza.

Le multumesc tuturor pentru un weekend minunat si sper sa ne revedem in curand la Bucuresti pentru ca urmeaza o serie de intalniri deosebit de importante asupra carora voi reveni intr-un post viitor.