Youth Against Violence, Belize travel to San Salvador

TODAY, a delegation of 20 powerful Belizean youth, are traveling to San Salvador to represent our nation, in the “First Central American Youth Against Violence Forum”.

The primary objective of the First Youth Against Violence Forum is to create a space where youth get to know, share, and analyze policies and strategies in youth violence prevention, while improving their advocacy and organization capacity.

• Socialize with youth from the 7 Central American countries, and share the Central American policy recommendations on violence prevention produced by the Central American Youth Movement Against Violence.
• Strengthen youth capacity from the Central American Movement in violence prevention, organization, and advocacy work.
• Integrate young representatives from the Central American Youth Movement Against Violence into dialogue and exchange their knowledge and experiences in violence prevention.

The Forum will be held on Thursday, November 29^th and Friday, November 30^th, 2012 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in San Salvador, with the participation of CAYMAV national chapters delegations from the 7 countries in the region, with 20 members each – a total of 140 delegates.

Approximately 25 experts will gather with youth, to analyze public policies for violence prevention and necessary training in violence prevention. The speakers will be regional and international experts, regional and national government officials, cooperating partners, communicators, the majority involved in violence prevention work.

Background

On December 13^th, 2011, the coordinators from the three National Movements of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras, along with the Secretary-General of the Central American Integration System (SICA – Spanish acronym) met in San Salvador to create a Central American Youth Movement Against Violence (CAYMAV). The international community, youth associations of SICA countries, relevant stakeholders and organizations of the regional institutions were invited to support the Movement in order to strengthen the democratic security in the region.  Belize is the 2^nd to last Central American nation invited to join the movement.