An important Somali delegation, composed of the President of the Parliament of Mogadishu, Mohamed Osman Jawari, and some parliamentarians has been received in these days in Rome. The visit of President Jawari is one of the tiles of the relaunch of the dialogue, at the highest level, between Rome and Mogadishu, as represented by the visit of the Somali President Sheikh Hassan Mohamud in September 2013, the first by a president of Somalia after the fall of the regime of Siad Barre.

The dialogue between Mogadishu and Rome, among the Somali and the Italian people, has never ceased, not even during the most difficult years of the civil war in Somalia, evidence of a special relationship between the two countries.

In these twenty years, the most significant direct contributions were given mainly from the world of solidarity and cooperation, by whom has been engaged in studies on Somalia from various disciplinary aspects, and there have been also journalists (as Ilaria Alpi and Miran Hrovatin, whose passing has been commemorated a few weeks ago) that have helped to keep up the interest and attention in Italy on Somalia.

The diplomatic and political commitment of Italy in this period has never failed, even amid setbacks and misunderstandings. This is testified by the constant accompaniment of the difficult transition phase, the chair of the IGAD Partners Forum, within which an important meeting in September in New York has been organized, as well as having organized in Rome a few of the steps that led to the definition of the new institutions.

The current phase requires the implementation of the permanent institutional Italian presence in the country, often announced by our government, that is the reopening the Italian embassy in Mogadishu. This would allow to better coordinate and enhance the efforts of our country in its relations with Somalia, taking on the role that belongs to us in the international community and the Somali institutions continue to ask us.

Despite the difficulties, both political and logistical, we believe that this decision should be finalized as soon as possible, as s other countries have done, to support the normalization process that seems to have started. We therefore count on Your interest to reopen as soon as possible the Italian embassy in Mogadishu, reaffirming the special relationship between the two countries.

Lia Quartapelle, President of AWEPA Italian section, Foreign Affairs Committee, Chamber of Deputies
Arturo Scotto, Africa Committee Chairman, Foreign Affairs Committee, Chamber of Deputies
Enzo Amendola, PD Leader, Foreign Affairs Committee, Chamber of Deputies
Federico Battera, University of Trieste
Giampaolo Calchi Novati, University of Pavia and ISPI
Bianca Carcangiu, University of Cagliari
Luciano Centonze, Cefa
Fabrizio Cicchitto, Chairman, Foreign Affairs Committee, Chamber of Deputies
Silvia Crespi, Cesvi
Maria De Carli, Grt
Francesca Declich, University of Urbino
Angelo Del Boca, essayist and historian of Italian colonialism
Paolo Dieci, Cisp
Giorgio Giacomelli, Italian Ambassador to Somalia (1973-1976)
Cinzia Giudici, Cosv
Christopher Hein, Directos of CIR, Italian Council for Refugees
Caterina Imbastari, Terranuova
Sara Malavolti, Cospe
Pierluigi Malesani, Rai
Alfredo Mantica, Undersecretary for Foreign Affairs (2001-2006, 2008-2011)
Pietro Marcenaro, President of the Human Rights Commission, Senate of the Republic (2008-2013)
Angelo Masetti, spokesman Italian-Somalia Forum for peace and reconstruction
Ennio Miccoli, Coopi
Antonio Maria Morone, University of Pavia and President of the Association for African Study in Italy
Osman Mohamed Gaal, President of the Somali Community in Italy
Valeria Pecchioni, Ccm
Annarita Puglielli, President of Somali Studies Centre, University of Roma Tre
Paolo Quercia, Cenass Director (Center for Near Abroad Strategic Studies)
Mario Raffaelli, Special Envoy of the Italian government for the Horn of Africa (2003-2008)
Paolo Romani, Forza Italia Leader, Foreign Affairs Committee, Senate of the Republic
Marco Rotelli, Intersos
Armando Sanguini, former Director for Sub-Saharan Africa, Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Special Envoy of the Italian Government for Africa
Nino Sergi, Intersos
Giorgio Tonini, PD leader, Foreign Affairs Committee, Senate of the Republic
Pietro Veronese, La Repubblica

23 April 2014

NON-PROFIT PEOPLE is the web series that LINK2007 has presented to “ARE YOU SERIES?”, a competition conceived by Milano Film Festival and realized with the support of Banca Prossima, for the production of 10 episodes about the Italian non-profit world.

Watch NON-PROFIT PEOPLE promo!

“NON-PROFIT PEOPLE” is a journey through ten countries and three continents, to see the activities implemented abroad by Italian non-profit through the NGO operators’ insight. The series aims at showing the different facets of working in cooperation, to learn about the activities on field and find out how to work with NGOs.

NGOs participating in this project are: CISP, COSV, GVC, ICU, INTERSOS, LVIA.

The project has passed the first selection!

“Just like in the Balkans” … A recurring phrase, in the comments on the tragedy in Ukraine. The comparison between what is happening today in Kiev and what happened at the end of the last century in Sarajevo has entered the discourse. A civil war in Europe, with Europe as guilty bystander . But there is an important difference. In the gap between the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia and the imminent disintegration of Ukraine, there’s the lacking of Europe integration. That comes later, badly and pointless to face the Ukrainian tragedy, squeezed between national interests, realpolitik and indifference. Back in in the roaring ’90s, it was the indifference of the wealthy. Today it’s the indifference-rejection of those who are not so wealthy, that closed in their own suffering or in their own interests, try to minimize the damage and maximize the profits of a war.

The failure of the European foreign policy on Ukraine is the mirror image of the economic policy on the euro. The two failures have indeed the same roots. Lack of cohesion, solidarity and common goals: the same lack that prevents governments to realize that excessive deficits of “spenders” is negative as much as a trade surplus of “virtuous”, that imbalances can be corrected by acting from both parts and not issuing report cards (and consequent punishment). Cohesion, solidarity and common goals would have recommend to all EU governments to move before, and not at random, on the border nascent crisis: avoiding to promise things not possible to be realized and not fueling nationalist tendencies, but listening to the aspirations of that part of Ukrainian society that looks to us as a possible future.

Sure, but why should we care? We were unable to save Athens, with its small debt and its great history, how will we ever be able to save Kiev with its large oil pipelines and its history not known to most people? Maybe it’s too late, maybe the realpolitik to Putin will impose a curfew on the barricades and the silence on the dictators. Or maybe it’s too early, the European election campaign heats up in the spring. When perhaps the slain of Kiev will already be deleted. Or, who knows, the maps on the borders of the European Union will be changed. But then please, let’s change the word also on this side of the border: the word Union, overrated since the beginning, is overtaken by the events.

– See more at: http://www.pagina99.it/news/mondo/4029/Ucraina–Europa.html#sthash.uiElsOwA.dpuf