Over 1,500 youth from around the world attended the recent World Conference on Youth in Sri Lanka. At the Conference, around 100 countries came together to consult on mainstreaming youth in the post 2015 agenda. In addition to youth, ministers and other senior government officials, development partners including the United Nations (UN), and representatives from civil society organizations, the media, academia, and the private sector participated.
At the opening ceremony the President of the UN General Assembly Dr. John William Ashe stated, "across the world, youth have shown the impact they can have in social and political movements ranging from the Middle East and Eastern Europe to Latin America and Africa”.
During the Conference, youth reflected on the impact and learning they had had over the last 15 years since the inception of the Millennium Development Goals. They also strongly advocated on the impacts they wanted to have for youth post-2015 in areas such as:
• The empowerment of marginalized youth, including most at risk youth.
• The removal of current punitive laws and policies discriminating against youth based on sexual orientation or on HIV status.
• The improvement of practices and policies around access to HIV services, including measurable indicators disaggregated by age, gender, location, linguistic base, wealth status, level of education, disability, ethnicity and key population status.
The conference had thematic sessions with panels and discussions which resulted in recommendations. At the same time, negotiations took place on how the recommendations would feed into a joint declaration – The Colombo Declaration on Youth. The negotiation process was undertaken by Member States, with one special seat allotted to a youth negotiator or someone who would negotiate on behalf of youth. Issues which were contentious during the negotiation process included sexual orientation and gender identity, sexual and reproductive health, and the promotion of rights-based approaches to these issues in the future.
The UN Secretary General’s Special Envoy on Youth, Ahmad Alhendawi, attended the Conference. He encouraged the UN to explore opportunities for meaningful youth participation, and youth input’s into all of the UN’s work. Following the conference, he suggested that the newly-established Youth Advisory Panel within the Sri Lanka UN County Team was a good practice, and one of the key highlights of his visit to Colombo. He encouraged UN agencies to study this model and other ways to support meaningful youth participation.
UNESCO Bangkok participated in the Conference, and provided support to a number of sessions and opportunities for exchange. This included contributing to:
• A capacity-building workshop on gender and sexuality, developed by the Inter-Agency Task Team for Women, Girls, HIV and Human Rights. The Gender/Sexuality Process Orientated Tool (GSPOT) was presented as an effective tool for youth networks. The session, co-facilitated with the young and dynamic Youth LEAD facilitators, attracted over 60 participants and was translated in Sinhalese and Tamil.
• The UN Booth, where youth participants count interact with UN agencies. At the booth UNESCO promoted and recruited young people to complete a Youth Opinion Poll which will help inform the United Nations Asia and the Pacific Report on Youth. This report, being developed by the Regional Coordination Mechanism - United Nations Development Group Asia-Pacific Thematic Working Group on Youth, is the first of its kind.
• A Gender Equality panel, where UNESCO emphasized the importance of including transgender people in our efforts towards gender equality, the participation of boys and men, and school-related gender based violence.
“It was inspiring to see the youth both conscious and concerned with issues surrounding gender equality. When we discussed school-related gender based violence and how the school should be one environment where students are safe, concern was shared from youth delegates about girls who had been recently kidnapped in Nigeria,” shared Sahba Delshad, UNESCO Bangkok’s Young Key Population Support Officer.
“This led to a section in the Colombo Declaration on gender equality - 41. Ensure the full engagement of states and international organizations as strategic partners and allies in promoting gender equality and preventing and condemning violence, especially kidnapping of women and girls for sexual and other unlawful purposes.”
The Conference reinforced the importance of working with marginalized youth and taking a rights-based approach towards gender and sexuality, and access to health services. The Declaration calls on the international community to work together to make the commitments, and the vision of youth participation and partnerships in development a reality.
For more information, please contact: Sahba Clara Delshad (s.delshad@unesco.org) or Justine Sass (j.sass@unesco.org)
Related Link:
UNESCO joins delegates from over 100 countries in support of youth development