Invitation: European cooperation on Civil Peace Services

Dear friends working on Projects of Civil Peace Service

Important steps have been made in the recent months concerning the establishment of CPS in many countries as well as on European level. We feel the deep wish and need to develop the cooperation in the field and encourage the development of non­violent conflict tools by inviting your organisation in taking part in these common efforts.

During the annual meeting of the European Network for Civil Peace Services, EN.CPS, the participating organisations agreed to strenghten their cooperation not only in sharing information and expertise, but also in the field work with projects.

Some of the organisations participating in the EN.CPS already have work with volunteers in conflict and crisis areas. Mainly in Kosovo, there are teams working on behalf of the Austrian Friedensdienste OFD, the German ForumZFD and the Swiss Coalition for CPS IG-ZFD. We invite you to strengthen all our experience and impact by opening up the projects for international cooperation in the field with deployments, but also in the back office work.

We warmly invite you to share with us the projects you are working on as Civil Peace Services and to open them up to international participation. The cooperation to be developed will depend completely on bilateral or multilateral agreements with the interested partner organisations. Some projects may need more volunteers, while others may seek for money or maybe promotion. Together, we are sure, we can make our work stronger and more prominent on field level, but also in international and political campaining for CPS. Please feel free to offer your own projects to any kind of participation you feel the project may need or to link your organisation up to some of the existing projects.

The first project open to international cooperation is the Swiss based Volunteers project “KIDS” in Vushtrri/Vucitrn in Kosovo. This project, run by three volunteers, aims at developing youth activities in this heavily destroyed town. You may find a description of the project in German with some English information also on the website www.4u2.ch

Also the German ForumZFD is in procedure to open up its project work in Kosovo. You will get information concerning these projects soon.

If you feel like joining to this KIDS project or if you have some project of your own which you would like to offer, please fill in the project information form on next page, and send it back to Roland Brunner at rbr@4u2.ch

Your offer or request will be spread to all organisations participating in the EN.CPS and you will get in direct contact with answers.

Together we can make a difference. We are looking forward your offers and invitation.

With our very best regards

On behalf of the EN.CPS: Janne Poort - van Eeden, Roland Brunner