Local Initiative in Bihać: Why to Stay Here?

On August 17th, Ademir Čaušević, an activist from Bihać and one of the participants in our Peace Training for Young people, implemented an all day activity called “Why stay here ?” at the Cultural Center in Bihac with the support of the Center for Peacebuilding.

At the very beginning of the introductions, they had the opportunity to learn how to improve the image of themselves and their presentation, and afterwards we spoke and discussed the reasons for young people leaving. The trainder linked the topic to human rights, and especially to the rights of young people in BiH, where they had the opportunity to read the Declaration of Human Rights, which is rarely talked about today.

The next part of the session was about young people thinking and trying to “make” and represent the state in which they want to live. This part of the session was done with the help of the Declaration of Human Rights. This is complemented by a Step Forward activity aimed at promoting empathy with others who are different, raising awareness of unequal opportunities in society and nurturing an understanding of the possible personal consequences of belonging to particular social minorities or cultural groups. At the end of the working day, they talked about stereotypes, prejudices and discrimination that are increasing in our society and are greatly affecting young people in their later lives. In the end, the participants wrote messages to the youth and messages to the authorities that would be sent to all of them to improve the situation in BiH.