Sponsor Bosnian-Herzegovinian youth to build peace

Since January 2021, Center for Peacebuilding has established four Youth Clubs in the Krajina region as part of the project Youth Regroup! Youth for Youth in Krajina. The Youth Clubs are opened in Sanski Most, Kljuc, Buzim and Novi Grad. 

From the start of the Youth Clubs, young people from these municipalities had the opportunitiy to participate in workshops and activities related to volunteering, youth activism, peace-building, entrepreneurship but also have movie nights, playing board games or just gatherings and socializing at the premises of the Youth clubs.

Till now these four Youth Clubs have gathered more than 260 young people on their activities and implemented more than 180 workshops and gatherings.

Last year in October, Center for Peacebuilding hosted an advanced seminar on peace building called Upgrade for Peace for previous Peace Camp participants. The participants have planned local initiatives in their communities and their implementation has now started in May. The first local initiative was organized in Doboj. At the local activity in Doboj called "Youth and (non) peace", the participants had the opportunity to participate in an interactive education on identities. They talked about what identities are, what their identities are and which identity is the most important for BiH society from their context. In addition, they could hear short stories that emerge on the road to peace building. The one-day activity also included a virtual tour of Doboj, participants who wanted to had the opportunity to tour the city of Doboj live after the end of the activity. The activity was realized in the following days, where the participants had the opportunity to talk over coffee, with the coordinator of this activity, on the same topics.

From the 21st till the 23rd of May CIM organized a Upgrade for Peace Reunion together with the participants from the first seminar and with their parents. During the two-day gathering, participants and parents had the opportunity to discuss the impact of CIM's activities on the individual development of participants. We visited the Blihe Waterfall - a natural attraction of our city, and held a field trip to the Garden of Opportunities, where we introduced parents to plans for the future

First of all, we would like to wish you all happy new year from all the staff members in CIM and we hope that you are all safe and healthy. 2020 has been a very busy year for us, and no doubt you have been very busy too. We hope you will have an amazing new year, and may most, if not all your resolutions become reality. 

In Novembar we organized the second training as part of the Youth Regroup! Youth for Youth in Krajina project. Through this project we want to increase the involvement of young people in advocating for their needs and interests, and develop the necessary skills and knowledge to lead local initiatives in their communities. The project covers 7 municipalities / cities in the Krajina region: Bihac, Buzim, Bosanska Krupa, Kljuc, Sanski Most, Prijedor and Novi Grad.  

On this occasion and with their active participation, young people gained theoretical as well as practical knowledge necessary for youth work and coordination of youth clubs. They have created a plan of future activities that they plan to implement in their local communities, and we hereby invite you to through attendance support young actors of social change in advocating for the interests and needs of youth.

After the second training within the Youth Regroup! Youth for youth in Krajina, youth from 7 municipalities started implementing local initiatives designed during the training. Upon returning to their communities, the participants actively worked on preparations, recruitment and on that occasion organized meetings with young people and representatives of non-governmental organizations in order to present the project and the importance and benefits of opening youth clubs. The first local initiative was held in Kljuc, within which the project participants organized an info desk and informed the public about the needs and problems of young people, as well as the future program of the youth club. The activity was visited by municipal councilors, a youth officer as well as representatives of non-governmental organizations who expressed satisfaction with the promise that the initiative will receive their support. In order to examine the needs and problems of youth as well as the degree of involvement in youth activism, project participants from Sanski Most created an online survey. They held a meeting with members of CIM’s volunteer club to whom they presented the project and plans regarding the opening of the youth club. The workshop on youth activism that followed was their final activity. The initiatives held in Kljuc and Sanski Most, in addition to the excellent response of youth, aroused the desire and motivation of participants for further learning and involvement in the activities of the Youth Club, and the support of local authorities .Initiatives held in Bihac, Bosanska Krupa, Buzim, Prijedor and Novi Grad also had a great response from young people from their municipalities and they openly talked about their needs and problems in their local communities.

After numerous successfully held local initiatives in 7 municipalities covered by the Youth regroup! Youth for youth in Krajina, we are starting with the work of youth clubs! Young people from these municipalities finally have the opportunity and space to socialize, learn and exchange experiences and knowledge, and jointly advocate for their needs in the local community. We are now entering the second month of the work of our Youth Clubs and our youth from these 4 municipalities had the opportunitiy to gain knowledge in different spheres such as youth activism, teambuilding, dancing, interreligious dialogue, digital peacebuilding and many more.

Since the situation with COVID-19 has made big changes in everyone lifes, we have tried to work on our Peace farm during and outside of our activities because in spite of all the things we cannot do in this situation we still have many things we can change and develop.

We were very pleased with the amount of vegetables and fruits with which the garden made us happy this year. We were able to sell some of the products to our local people in Sanski Most and the rest we were using to give to the people which were helping in seeding all of those seeds.

Even with the situation which surrounds us, we were able to organize many camps and educations at the Peace Farm during the summer time. Within the STaR project we organized two Peace Camp, a Training for Trainers and a Retreat program for all the youth participants from our Peace Camps. We also started about youth activism with the youth from the Krajina region and we were able to implement one training at the Peace Farm.

In every of these trainings and camps we organized teambuilding activities where we all together did work at the farm such as: cleaning the forest, making the a fireplace, cleaning the garden and picking up all the seeds, cleaning the area around the farm to be ready for future construction.

We feel really blessed also to announce that we made our first building at the Peace Farm which will be used as a work place such a space for workshops and for relaxing filled with various social games.

We hope that you all safe and healthy, and we would like to proudly show you our work in the last four months.

With respecting all epidemiological measures set by the Crisis Headquarters Center for Peacebuilding managed to organize six major activities as part of various projects.

First Peace Camp

From the 26th of June till the 4th of July, 25 Young people from 10 municipalities from Bosnia Herzegovina attended the seven-day long Peace Camp 2020 within the STaR project at CIM's Peace Farm. Young people from all around Bosnia and Herzegovina had the opportunity to listen and learn about topics and themes as identities, prejudices, stereotypes, nonviolent conflict resolution and more.In the second part of the day participants had teambuilding activities at the Peace Farm where they together had the chance to make together a fireplace, clean the forest and enjoy our permaculture garden and also they also helped us to maintain it with mulching and hoeing the garden. We also showed participants the center of Sanski Most, they had the opportunity to hear historical stories and anecdotes about this City. Also we introduced to our participants the beauties of the City. We visited the two most touristic attractions and most visited places in Sanski Most, Waterfall Bliha and Bobijaško oko. On the last two days of the Peace Camp, participants together planned local initiatives with will be implemented in their local communities.

Local youth initiatives

In July and August 10 local initiatives were organized in the local communities within the STaR project.

Our first local initiative was held on the 26th of July in Sokolac. At the activitiy participants had the chance with our directors from CIM Vahidin and Mevludin to learn more about prejudices and dialogue, as well as ways and rules of how to conduct a proper diagloue. Our second local initiative was implemented in Olovo. Our Peace Camp participants organized the activity in the Sports Center on the 27th of July. Young people from Olovo gained insight into the proper consideration and overcoming of prejudices, how to gain new knowledge and verified information in a peaceful way, ie through conversation. The third local initiative was held in Bijeljina entitled "Prevent misunderstanding, choose a photo and words". Participants had the opportunity to participate in a discussion on peace activism and post-war events in BiH. This was followed by a workshop on "Hate speech and the spread of nationalism on the Internet." Why it is important to communicate in the form of dialogue, our participants have recognized during the recent held Peace Camp and decided that non-violent communication should be the topic of their local initiative in Banja Luka! In addition to the workshop on the benefits of dialogue, a lecture on assertive communication was held, led by a psychologist and participant of the second Peace Camp. On the 6^th of August a local initiative was held in Doboj called "A Step for Peace".
The activities were attended by young people from Doboj, and as part of this activity they visited four religious buildings, the Orthodox Church, mosque, synagogue and Catholic- church where they learned about the history of these buildings and the religious rites performed in them. The activity continued in the American Corner, where they hosted young peacebuilders and led discussions on a variety of topics from activism to peace building. On the 7th of august in Velika Kladuša, in the premises of the Alternative House of Culture, one of the local initiatives was held, participants of the local initiative had the opportunity to discuss extracurricular activities, competitions, improvement of the education system, the benefits of non-formal education as well as opportunities for personal growth and development. On the 8th of August, one of the local initiatives called "RestArt" was held in Jajce and implemented by our participants. Participants had the opportunity to learn about arts and peace building and how to connect the two areas. On the 17th of August, the 8th local initiative was successfully implemented in Sarajevo, they talked about the work of Center for Peacebuilding, the STaR project and the activities that follow. However, the central theme of this activity is the position of migrants in the capital of BiH, but also beyond, their experience and the path from leaving their country to arriving in a safe area. A local initiative of participants from Mostar called "Enigma" was held on the 18^th of August in the premises of the PRONI youth club. We discussed the importance of peace building projects, the possibilities of involvement in them, and held workshops on prejudice and the role of identity in the peace building process. On the 19^th of August in Stolac, the last initiative called "Through prejudice to freedom" was successfully held. Participants had the opportunity to meet and talk about the current problems of today. Young people talked in a pleasant atmosphere about prejudices and ways to overcome them.

Training for Trainers

Participants had the opportunity to meet and talk about the current problems of today in a fun way. Young people from Stolac talked in a pleasant atmosphere about prejudices and ways to overcome them. Our participants learned about the design and implementation of workshops and in the coming days they had the opportunity to lead workshops independently which themes were: identities, prejudices and steretypes, peacebuilding, faciliation of dialogue and a lot of more. Since CIM is planing on organising an event for all our Peace Camp and Caravan participants, we were making a design of which activities and workshops our Trainers will be doing on the Retreat. The afternoon time of the ToT was for the teambuilding activities such as playing volleyball, making an Instagram wall for taking pictures, and also working in the garden where our participants showed a lot of team work and helping each other in every situation.

Second Peace Camp

From the 29^th of August till the 6^th of September the Second Peace Camp was held within the STaR project at the CIM’s Peace Farm. 20 young people from 10 municipalities from Bosnia and Herzegovina attended the second Peace Camp. For our educational part of the Peace camp which were workshops who were based on identities, prejudices, stereotypes as well as peace building and resources in our local communities that we need for our future peace activities. The workshops were held by CIM’s directors. They talked and learned in an experiential way about the differences between debate and dialogue. The participants became aware of the advantages of leading a dialogue and the importance of its use in conflicting, but also in everyday situations.
For the working part at the Peace camp the participants had the opportunity to clean around the farm, work in the garden and forest.
The camp has encouraged many new ideas for future peace activities and we can proudly say that it was more than successful.

Youth Regroup! Youth for Youth in Krajina.

With the first training held in the period from 6th to 11th September, Center for Peacebuilding officially started implementing the Youth regroup! Youth for youth in Krajina project. Through this project we want to increase the involvement of young people in advocating for their needs and interests, and develop the necessary skills and knowledge to lead local initiatives in their communities. The project covers 7 municipalities / cities in the Krajina region: Bihac, Buzim, Bosanska Krupa, Kljuc, Sanski Most, Prijedor and Novi Grad. After a total of 3 trainings, youth from these municipalities will become youth leaders who will initiate social changes in their local communities, advocate for the interests of young people and coordinate the activities of youth clubs that will be established during the project. On Friday, the 11th of September, finished the first training within the Youth regroup! Youth for youth in Krajina project implemented by the Center for Peacebuilding.
The training was attended by 22 young people from 7 municipalities covered by the project: Bihac, Buzim, Bosanska Krupa, Kljuc, Sanski Most, Prijedor and Novi Grad. The goal of the first training is to increase the level of self-awareness, create space for self-awareness, and learn and raise awareness of prejudices so that participants acquire the skills of an objective approach to different groups of people. During the training, young people learned about the importance of identity, the consequences of prejudice and stereotypes, the concept of peacebuilding, and dialogue skills as one of the most important tools in the field of peacebuilding and non-violent conflict resolution.

RETREAT Program

In order to celebrate CIM's 11th International Peace Week, Center for Peacebuilding organized a programe called Retreat within the STaR project (Societal Transformation and Reconciliation) where a series of activities took place between 16th and 22nd September. The Retreat was attended by participants of the Peace camps and caravans, all young peacebuilders who participated in local initiatives of the Peace camp participants, as well as those who wanted to network and socially with youth from different areas of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Trainers who participated in the Training for Trainers and prepared their workshops for this event in those days had the opportunity to implement their workshops. Most of the workshops were creative and they were also preparing different things to present for the International Peace Day.

The workshops which were held at the Retreat program are:

1) Peacebook, this workshop will have three main activities. The first one is making a Peacebook which is conceived as an album with photos and stories of trainers and participants of CIM’s RETREAT, through which we would present their peace journey. At the second activity participants will have the opportunity to learn the basics of photography and transfer what they have learned by documenting the entire Retreat program through images. And in the third and last one participants will in a fun and creative way create an Instagram frame called PEACEgram and learn how to make memes.

2) Storytelling, in this workshop, participants will have the opportunity to learn about verbal and non-verbal communication techniques, breathing techniques, and how they can develop their communication skills.

3) Peace monument, making a peace monument which will represent the STaR project at the Farm which will be presented on the International day of Peace and to leave a mark for future generations.

4) Foodology, where they will be preparing and making food for the Peace day.

5) Time capsule, where trainers and organizers will be able through the whole Retreat write letters, peace messages which will be put in the time capsule and buried.

6) CIM's Peace Games, which will be held at the International Peace day. The activity will consist of 6 games in which all Retreat participants will be able to participate. Participation is on a voluntary basis. The goal of these games is to get to know the participants better, have fun and develop creativity.

7) Peace in verse, the aim of the activity is understanding the thesis of art without borders, ie accepting literature as a general, universal cultural good of humanity; self-reflection through consideration of offered literary texts; sharing personal feelings and experiences; fostering compassion and empathy.

UPGRADE FOR PEACE

Upgrade for Peace is an advanced seminar in the field of peacebuilding and conflict transformation that was implemented from 1st to 6th October 2020.
The training was attended by 20 participants from all over Bosnia and Herzegovina who already have experience with peacebuilding and were previous participants in seminars or camps of Center for Peacebuilding.
Participants had the opportunity to learn about re-examining themselves and their intentions, pillars of peace work, the model of Circles of Revenge and Trust and through exercises learned about the steps that lead them to forgiveness and how to get out of the circle of revenge and reach reconciliation. Participants also participated in creating concepts for creating youth activities in their local communities.
Participants demonstrated their teamwork through teambuilding activities which is also an important part in peace building. The Upgrade for Peace was implemented with the financial support of the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung.

We hope that you are all okay, healthy and safe at your homes.

Before the start of the pandemic COVID-19, CIM's Peace Camp and Caravan participants which was held in December last year have implemented their local initiatives in February and March. The local initiatives were held in Doboj, Banja Luka, Sarajevo, Olovo and Sokolac and the youth from these communities had the opportunity to attend workshop on the subject peace and reconciliation.

After canceling all local youth initiatives planned in March and April because of the state of emergency caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, CIM staff has worked on a strategy to organize them online. We have held several online meetings with the team members to find a solution and adjust their working agenda to online workshops.

The first online workshop was held by the participants from Jajce, the two-day local youth initiative of Jajce “Peace activism in period of social distance” was organized on April 16th and 17th. During the first day the former Peace camp and caravan participants held a workshop about prejudices and stereotypes. On the second day, youth workers held an interactive workshop about youth activism.

The  next was the two-day local initiative of Velika Kladuša “With knowledge to peace” which was organized on April 18th and 19th via Zoom platform. During these two days 10 youth from Velika Kladuša had the opportunity to learn from the journalist and activist Amir  who is the recipient of a special plaque awarded in the frame of the Journalist Award "Sran Aleksic" for professional reporting in year 2019. The main topic of these workshops was media literacy. The youth defined media literacy as ability and skills to filter a great amount of information and extract the true ones.

On the April 25th and 27th the local initiative of Bijeljina named “Art and peace are not slogans but life” was organized via Zoom platform. In total 20 youth from Bijeljina and Sarajevo attended this activity. On the first day volunteers of PRONI club in Sarajevo, held an interactive workshop about teambuilding. On the second day, a psychology student and volunteers of PRONI youth club from Bijeljina Irena held an interactive workshop about stereotypes and prejudices. Through a survey she explained the definition of stereotypes and prejudice, the differences between them and the examples of them

The local initiative of Stolac called “With art to peace” was held on May 4th via Zoom. First, Davor who is a former Peace camp and caravan participant and an aspiring actor shared his experience and ways of using art in peacebuilding.  Dalila is a lover of fine arts. She showed her art work created during isolation. She emphasized the calming effect art has for her and the importance of finding an activity that makes us relaxed and satisfied. Amar and Adel are independent amateur musicians. They played various songs on a guitar and showed the magical effect of music by connecting people across the country and even region.

Local initiative of Mostar – “Shock seminar” was organized on May 4th via Zoom. The coordinator of PRONI youth club in Mostar held an interactive presentation about I-speech which is way of assertive communication. After this short but useful and concrete topic, a member of a theater group from Mostar spoke about his work and experience by working on peacebuilding in his community. He organized a theater performance which focused on the present division between Croats and Bosniaks living in Mostar. Through his work he wants to emphasize the absurdity of two sites of the city and the on going division, hate and distrust. And the third short presentation was about meditation and yoga, and the benefits she noticed practicing it.

On April 21st the initiative #letstalk from the former Peace camp and caravan participants and the Volunteers club from Sanski Most has officially started. #letstalk is conceived as a platform where youth can talk, discuss and exchange about various topics interesting to them and host guests like activists, athletes, psychologists, actors, musicians. After a survey started on Facebook, the youth choose to talk about books at the first meeting. Milena, a former Peace camp and caravan participant moderated this meeting.

The second meeting of youth – Art in Peacebuilding was held on April 25th. The guest and moderator of this meeting was Davor, a former Peace camp and caravan participant and amateur actor. He spoke about the role of art in peacebuilding. The participants discussed what art means for them and tried to find a definition of art.

For this next meeting the youth invited the director of the association Forgotten children of War Ajna. Although, her name and story are well known for citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina, she shared her life experience with the participants. Ajna is a child of a women who was a victim of sexual violence – rape during war 1992-1995. She started to talk about the stigmatization her mother and she as her child were experiencing living in a small community. Her childhood was marked with bullying and rejection of the peers, community and, in her words “whole country”. After she waited over twenty-three years, she decided with other children of sexual violence during conflict to establish the association Forgotten children of War. The mission of this association is to change the mindset of society towards victims of sexual violence, reduce stigmatization and give psychological, social and legally support.

After Ajna, Larisa was the guest on the #letstalk platform. Larisa is a 29 year- old Bosnian judoka, and most successful Bosnian athlete ever. On the 30th of April, 12 young people talked to Larisa about the position of sports in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and the role of sports in society in general. During the 60-minute conversation, young people asked questions such as: "How to motivate young people to do professional sports?", "What does a professional athlete's day look like?", "How does sport help to overcome problems in society?" etc.

Let’s talk with Amel was held on May 7th via Zoom. Amel is a Bosnian athlete. He is currently the most trophy athlete in Bosnia and Herzegovina. His disciplines are short and medium track, and in these disciplines, he has set two national records and numerous European records. Looking at his successful career he emphasized the importance of one thing – dedication.

On May 12th, we organized another #letstalk meeting and on this occasion talked with youth about tourism in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Milena, a former Peace camp and caravan participant moderated this meeting. First the participants talked about their willingness to travel around Bosnia and Herzegovina. Many of the youth haven’t visited or explored their home country.

#letstalk about movies and serials was held on 29th of May. Fatima who was a participant of Dialogue facilitation seminar moderated this meeting. Ten participants decided to spend their time by sharing their favourite movies and serials. Fatima prepared a presentation of the best movies and serials of 21st century based on the reviews of BBC and the Guardian.

On the fifth of June the former Peace camp and caravan participants hosted Uroš, an actor and youth activist from Novi Sad, Serbia. Davor  moderated this meeting. Uroš introduced himself and his work from the beginning in the area of acting. Uroš presented the work of a theater group “Teatarnova” a project which enables youth to express themselves through theater. In the second part of the meeting he asked the participants to actively participate in reading and acting in a dialogue.

After the decision of separating Peace camp and caravan, CIM has published the call for participants for the Peace camp which will be organized in the period of June 26th till July 3rd. The call was officially published on CIM’s Facebook page on 8th of June.

We want to thank everyone who has been helping and following our work during the pandemic.  We wish you all who is reading this health and safety during this time, and don’t get unmotivated because our youth showed us that they you can do a lot of great work online too.