Belo
Horizonte, Brazil - Youth from
throughout Latin America and the Caribbean
will be converging on the city of
Belo Horizonte on May 12-15, 2005
for the first regional summit aimed
at mobilizing young people to initiate
efforts to overcome poverty and violence
to help achieve the Millennium Development
Goals. The Latin America and Caribbean
Youth Leadership Summit is jointly
organized by the United Nations New
York Office of Sport for Development
and Peace on behalf of the UN system,
the Government of Brazil, the Global
Peace Initiative of Women, the city
of Belo Horizonte, and the Citizenship
Institute.
Participants in the Summit will
include some of the most outstanding
young people of the region. They were
chosen by the United Nations agencies
for their achievements, leadership
potential, and strong commitment to
social change. The young delegates
will be joined by United Nations experts
on the thematic areas of the Millennium
Development Goals, who will facilitate
the discussions and provide guidance
and support.
As
many as 1,000 youth are expected to
participate in the opening ceremony
of the Summit, where President
Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of Brazil
will address the delegates, calling
on them to work as partners with governments
to meet the challenges confronting
the region. President Lula de Silva
has said that young people are “our
brightest lights, showing us the way
forward.”
The
Latin America and Caribbean Youth
Leadership Summit is part of a global
United Nations effort to engage with
young leaders. Speaking about the
importance of youth initiatives, UN
Secretary-General Kofi Annan
asserted: “No one is born a
good citizen; no nation is born a
democracy. Rather, both are processes
that continue to evolve over a lifetime.
Young people must be included from
birth. A society that cuts itself
off from its youth severs its lifeline.”
World leaders have endorsed the Millennium Development Goals for 2015, calling
for: eradication of extreme poverty
and hunger, primary education for
all children, gender equality and
empowerment of women, reduced child
deaths, improved maternal health,
combating HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other
diseases, environmental sustainability
and forging a global partnership for
development. Participants will have
the opportunity to tap into sports,
a pillar of their societies with wide
appeal among young people, as a tool
for mobilizing support for the Millennium
Development Goals. The International
Year of Sport and Physical Education
2005 (IYSPE 2005) offers a framework
for such initiatives.
“The
Latin American and Caribbean Youth
Leadership Summit will help bring
young people into the global network
of committed and talented young professionals
that we are establishing through a
series of summits. Our goal is to
provide the opportunities and the
platform so they can become strong
forces for change in the effort to
meet the Millennium Development Goals,
“said Dr. Djibril Diallo,
Chair of the United Nations youth
leadership series and Director of
the UN New York Office of Sport for
Development and Peace.
The Summit is the third in a series of regional youth leadership gatherings
that will culminate in a Global Youth
Leadership Summit at the United Nations
in New York. Prior meetings included
the Pan- African Youth leadership
Summit in Dakar, Senegal in June,
2004 and the Pan- Asian Youth Leadership
Summit in Hiroshima, Japan in September,
2004.
For
further information, please contact:
Maristela Marques Baioni,
United Nations
Development Programme, Brazil:
Tel.:
55 61 3038 9098. E-mail: maristela.baioni@undp.org.br
or Karima Zerrou,
UN New York Office
of Sport for Development and Peace:
Tel.: 212 457 1075. E-mail: karima.zerrou@undp.org.
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