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UNESCO United Nations Educational, Scientific & Cultural Organisation |
The project In Support to the Russian Federation for Restoration of the Education System in the Chechen Republic has been implemented by the RF Ministry of Education with their colleagues from the Chechen Republic Ministry of Education. The project is receiving technical assistance and support from UNESCO with a budget of more than $296,000 USD, financed as an extrabudgetary project from the Japanese Fund in Trust. The Steering Committee is headed by RF Minister of Education Vladimir Fillippov.
"The first phase of the project aims at conducting an analysis of the education situation in Chechnya, and the drafting of strategic planning document for the reestablishment and reform of education that meets the needs of the 21th century," - commented Vasily Migerikov, who has been appointed as National Coordinator.
This May, two workshops, one in Moscow (14-16 May) and one in Rostov-on-Don (17-20 May), along with the training of the data collectors (21-23 May), were organized by the UNESCO Moscow Office. Tobi Lanzer (OCHA, UNHCR), Enrico Leonardy (UNICEF) and Igor Filin (UNDP) took part in the opening ceremony and expressed their organizations' interest in joining the project in its next phases.
The design of the Assessment Report and the instruments for collecting statistical data were thoroughly discussed by Russian and Chechen experts. Warren Mellor, from the UNESCO Headquarters and Anand Srivastava, UNESCO consultant for statistics, took part in the seminars and training.
The working group, represented by experts from the RF Ministry of Education; Ministry of Federal Affairs, National and Migration Policy; the RF Ministry of Foreign Affairs; Ministry of Education of the Chechen Republic; and several research institutes at the RF Academy of Education, started its work as well.
"The Assessment Report should be completed before next November," noted Vasily Migerikov. "It will include more than 20 project proposals for concrete action on the territory of the ChR, such as the reconstruction and repairment of educational institutions, providing educational equipment, and organizing retraining for the teachers and rehabilitation for the children. We will request that all this projects receive funding and technical assistance from the federal budget and abroad".
Project Manager
Igor Danilov
Tel. (+7 095) 202-81-66
Fax: (+7 095) 202-05-68
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"We have experience in cooperating effectively with national public organizations, which allows government authorities to find local solutions to the problems of ethnic communities," said Nikolay Bugai, Head of the Department of Nationalities of the Ministry of Federal Affairs, National and Migration Policy. Mr Bugai was opening a round table discussion on "National and Public Organizations: Their Role in Achieving Civil Harmony and Friendship in Society", held in Tula on April 27, 2001. The meeting was hosted by Dostlug-Druzhba international non-governmental organization and Ministry of Federal Affairs, National and Migration Policy. Financial support for the conference came from the European Union’s European Commission Office in Russia and the UNESCO Moscow Office.
Among the more than 60 participants were activists from many of the nation’s regional ethnic communities: Azeri, Belarussian, Lezgin, Kurd, German, Ukrainian, Gipsy, Adjar, Georgian and Jewish.
A report by Oleg Kuznetsov, Adviser to the President of Dostlug-Druzhba, concerned the legal bases of national NGO activities. According to Mr Kuznetsov, the problem with many Russian NGOs is that many of their leaders are not well informed on the rights and opportunities provided by Russian law, and are therefore not able to use ethnic public abilities effectively.
A dialogue between Marif Mahmudov, Vice-President of Dostlug-Druzhba and Vladimir Agafonov, Deputy Head of the Tula Region Interior Department was very exiting. It covered the five years of cooperation between the organization and regional law-enforcement bodies. Both reporters considered most effective methods of cooperation and designed prospects of their future work.
As Marif Mahmudov stressed, "The cooperation between Dostlug-Druzhba and Tula Region Interior Department is Russia’s only example of effective joint work between ethnic community and law-enforcement agencies".
A total of 26 reports and speeches were heard during the two days of the conference.
The results of the conference were summed up in a resolution that was approved unanimously.
Another immediate result of the conference was the signing of a protocol for cooperation between the Tula Region Interior Department and Dogtlug-Druzhba, as well as an agreement on collaboration between the Regional Branch of the Ministry of Federal Affairs, National and Migration Policy and Dostlug-Druzhba. These documents strengthened the close partnership between the agencies of the executive brand and the region’s ethnic communities.
Details are available at http://www.culture.of.peace.ru
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UN Information Center |
"The UN considers national mass media, including those of Russia,
as important partners in 
promoting
contemporary approaches to the serious problems on the international agenda,
including the status of indigenous peoples," said Vladimir Petrovsky, the UN
Under-Secretary-General, and Director General of the UN Office at Geneva. He
was opening the "Society for All: To Expand Participation of the Indigenous
Peoples in the Civil Society" conference, which was held at the Moscow UN Information
Centre on April 26. Held as part of the International Decade of the World’s
Indigenous Peoples and the International Year of the Fight Against Racism, the
conference included representatives of the indigenous peoples’ mass media from
the Russian North, Far East, Altai, and Yakutia, along with members of the nation-wide
press, Parliament, and UN Offices.
"The provisions of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights are completely applicable to the destiny of indigenous peoples," noted Yuri Reshetov, Member of the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, and Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary. This question is high on the Committee’s agenda, he said, calling for the representatives of indigenous peoples to contribute to Russia’s National report on the topic. Professor Reshetov emphasized that a nation’s attitude to the rights of its indigenous peoples is one of the criteria of how civilized and democratic it truly is.
Oleg Egorov, President of the Information Centre of the Indigenous Peoples of Russia, was actively involved in planning the conference. He shared his thoughts about how the UN can help indigenous peoples "to speak with their own voice". He gave high marks to two regional working meetings on the indigenous peoples’ mass media organized by the UN Secretariat. In his opinion, the UNIC conference was a follow-up to the working meeting held in New York in December, 2000.
The discussion went basically in two directions: the situation of journalists from the indigenous peoples’ mass media and the UN’s role in protecting the interests of indigenous peoples, and preserving their national identity in the era of globalization. Olga Terletskaya, Editor of the Indigenous Peoples’ Affairs Department of the Niariana Vynder (Red Tundra Dweller) newspaper, published in the Nenets Autonomous District, noted with sadness the shortage of journalists for the indigenous mass media. The delegates to the conference also mentioned unsufficient financing, the lack of opportunities for professional growth, and frequent administrative control and restrictions on the freedom of expression as being among the other acute problems influencing the status of the indigenous peoples’ mass media.
Despite differences of opinion, the journalists agreed on one main point: there is no alternative to strengthening cooperation and solidarity among journalists from the nation-wide and regional mass media, so long as they do their best to correctly portrey the problems and the expectations of the nation’s indigenous peoples in the press and on TV.
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"I am glad that we were able to achieve such good progress in short time". This is how Vladimir Storchevus, director of the Moscow Executive Office of the UN Habitat Centre, commented on the results of a round table discussion held on May 11 by the Russian Federation State Committee on Construction and Municipal Housing Complex and the UN Information Centre in Moscow. The participants discussed preparations for a special session of the UN General Assembly ("Istanbul + 5") in New York on June 6-8, 2001 as a follow-up to the Habitat II UN Conference on Human Settlements. "The meeting was a success largely due to the participation of representatives from the Russian Government, the Foreign Affairs Ministry, the Moscow City Government, certain non-governmental organizations, the UN Agencies in Russia (UNDP, UNESCO), and a representative from the Habitat Headquarters in Nairobi", Mr Storchevus noted. "Urban administration officials, along with representatives from local self-government and city planning agencies from Yaroslavl, Ulyanovsk, Tula and Perm also took an active part in the meeting. They did not just enrich the discussion; they also brought a much-needed practical dimension to it"."We discussed the main elements of Russia’s national report to the special session of the UN General Assembly, and the national priorities of the Russian Federation as a country with a transitional economy, in the context of international cooperation in the sustainable development of human settlements. At the end of the meeting, we adopted our final recommendations for the Russian delegation to the special session of the UN General Assembly. We are going to meet again after New York to put our heads together and think of ways to transform the results of the session into concrete actions in this country", Vladimir Storchevus concluded.
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United Nations Association of Russia |
On April 25, 2001, the first meeting of the Russian Committee for celebrating the International Year of Volunteers (IYV) was held at the Moscow Institute of International Relations (MGIMO). The date was not chosen casually. On the same day 56 years ago, the the United Nations’ founding Conference opened in San Francisco.
Anatoly Torkunov, Chairman of the Russian Committee on IYV, Rector of MGIMO, Chairman of the UN Association of Russia, opened the meeting. It was chaired by Yuri Reshetov, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary, who presented a government resolution on the IYV Russian Committee.
Taking part in the meeting were 6 ministry representatives; 3 representatives from international organizations, including UNDP; and 8 representatives from NGOs. This mixture of governmental and non-governmental agencies proved to be efficient. The committee produced a wide list of proposals for measures and projects which can be implemented as part of the IYV.
Not only did the committee members propose many interesting ideas and projects for celebrating the International Year of Volunteers, they also expressed their readiness to allocate funds for the implementation of the plans they had drawn up. The members of the committee hope that a wide variety of organizations in Russia will consider participating in the carrying out of those plans, as the volunteer movement is an effective way of uniting the people and inculcating the best of human qualities.
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An International Model UN was held at the Moscow Institute of International Relations on April 16-19. The event was sponsored by the UN Association of Russia, under aegis of the World Federation of UN Associations. More than 400 students arrived from across the CIS, Europe, and China to take part in the forum. In a special message to the delegates, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan specified the role of the youth in the creation of the new global order. The seriousness and importance of this forum was emphasized by RF Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov in a greeting delivered by his deputy, Sergey Orjonikidze, at the opening ceremony.
The participants discussed the actual problems of the world
community. Most important was that the students’ decisions might put into practice,
as they were sent on to the UN Secretariat. Each participant represented his
"own" country in that or another UN body – the
General Assembly, the Security Council, ECOSOC, or the International Court.
The delegates had to complete a complicated task: abstracting from their personal
attitudes to a problem to assert consistently a position of their "native" country.
To the credit of the overwhelming majority of the students, they performed the
task brilliantly.
The four-day sessions ended with all the Bodies of Model passing resolutions that were immediately sent on to the UN Secretariat. The General Assembly formed by the students drew up and ratified a resolution on informational security, the ECOSOC adopted a resolution on the problems of the environment and sustainable development. The Security Council passed a resolution on settling the situation in Afghanistan, while the International Court delivered a judgement concerning the destiny of Augusto Pinochet.
"The importance of our forum is obvious", noted Alexander Bryantsev, one of its participants. "First of all, the UN obtains information on how young people propose to solve existing global problems. Second, it is very good professional training for the students. Eventually, after twenty years or so, some of them might actually be working at the real UN, and the future of all the world will depend on their professional skills".
