We present the second part of an interview with Jerzy Onuch: “Because It Is Different Here. Ukrainian Project Dubai”. Paweł Laufer is talking to the former director of the Centre for Contemporary Art in Kyiv and former director of the Polish Institute in Kyiv about the present-day status of Ukrainian art.  PART ONE| PART TWO

Today, if you want to learn about activities and the policy of the European Union towards Belarus, you may easily do it online and choose what you like more. Which websites give the best coverage on the relationship between Belarus and the European Union? Adaria Gushtyn offers a short overview of the Belarusian Internet space. [...]

We present the first part of an interview with Jerzy Onuch: “Because It Is Different Here. Ukrainian Project Dubai”. Paweł Laufer is talking to the former director of the Centre for Contemporary Art in Kyiv and former director of the Polish Institute in Kyiv about the present-day status of Ukrainian art.  PART ONE| PART TWO

Is the EU going to expand in the near future? What should Belarus, Ukraine and other countries do to collaborate more closely with the EU? During his last visit in Minsk, Günter Verheugen, former vice president of the European Commission, who recently visited Belarus, shared with us his thoughts on these issues. Last week in [...]

The Eastern Partnership Visa Liberalisation Index was launched by the Visa-free Europe Coalition. The Index presents the results of independent assessment of progress made by the Eastern Partnership countries towards visa liberalisation. It is available at: monitoring.visa-free-europe.eu. The Eastern Partnership Visa Liberalisation Index shows in an accessible and interactive way the independent assessment of the [...]

It seems that recently numerous Belarusian political refugees have been involved in scandals and intrigues. We cannot judge whether they are real or just exaggerated rumours, but at least we should accept some unpleasant truths that cause such rhetoric. These truths may  even look like truisms, yet they still need to be articulated in order to [...]

International photo contest “Diversity in my Community” to reflect the importance of cultural diversity in local community development in Ukraine and Armenia Source: Eastern Partnership Culture Programme Deadline: 01.06.2013 Related Project: Equal Opportunities for National Minorities and Disadvantaged Groups in Realising Cultural Rights: Richness Through Diversity GURT Resource Centre (Ukraine) in partnership with Civil Development and Partnership Foundation (Armenia) [...]

Not only showed the 2010 presidential election the cruelty and impudence of the Belarusian authorities, but also the lack of discipline and irresponsibility of the opposition leaders. The so-called “solidarity” is still a distant dream. An average Belarusian, being already disappointed with the ruling elite, is not looking for help from numerous parties, civil initiatives [...]

“Russia makes an offer we cannot refuse, while the European Union – one we cannot understand”. Brussels wonders  how to assess progress of the Eastern Partnership programme. On 5 October 2012 in Brussels, the conference “On the Road to Reform: Assessing Progress in the Eastern Neighborhood” was held. The main organizer was the Open Society [...]

Having observed both the early voting and the election day of the parliamentary elections in Belarus, the project participants noted facts of psychological pressure on independent observers, cases of them being groundlessly expelled from polling stations, attempts of almost twofold over-estimation of turnout and a lack of transparent vote-count at almost all precincts. Watch the [...]

On 18 September, the first day of early voting for Belarus’ 23 September parliamentary elections, more than 30 testimonies describing various violations of voter’s rights were submitted to the citizen election monitoring platform Electby. In the past, voters during this period of the campaign would usually just report that they were being forced to vote [...]

Would you like to go off the beaten path, get to the bottom of things, and give your readers a never-before-seen look at Central and Eastern Europe or China? Or have you discovered a topic in Germany, Austria, or Switzerland that your audience in Central and Eastern Europe or China has to hear about? Would [...]

The course aims to introduce to students different social practices of contemporary culture in Ukraine. This aim is to be reached by discussing core concepts and key ideas that are in the center of Ukrainian intellectual and political debates, such as post-Soviet condition, working class in Ukraine, visa system and the question of borders, the [...]

The Swiss Cooperation Office in the Republic of Moldova is pleased to announce that the Government of Switzerland, through the Federal Commission for Scholarships for Foreign Students, is providing prospective researchers from the Republic of Moldova with the following types of scholarships for the academic year 2013-2014: Scientific Research Scholarships — for 12 months with [...]

For students in Ukraine, 1 September means the end of holidays and the beginning of a school year. However, yet in April information about admission to medical and dental faculties of Ukrainian universities addressed to Polish students who “failed ‘Matura’” (Polish A-levels) started to appear over the Internet. So how does the Ukrainian higher education [...]

If you keep silence, you will be said by others instead. While Ukrainian film production keeps silence, leading foreign producers do not ignore Ukraine. Mostly it comes down to the distortion of reality and playing the stereotypes. We offer you an updated list of foreign TOP-5 SERIALS and TOP-10 MOVIES in recent years, mentioning Ukraine. SERIALS [...]

Seminar for skill development of junior academics and young disseminators from Germany and Poland from 21 to 26 October 2012. Held in cooperation with the Polish Robert Schuman Foundation in Warsaw. German and Polish experiences as well as theoretical aspects of system change, transformation and democratisation will be taken as a starting point, in order to compare the [...]

The “Public Program” is a civic initiative aimed at developing a new positive vision of the future for Belarus. On the way to achieve it, we attempt to combine professional efforts of experts’ community with participation of a wide range of citizens through discussing the most urgent issues concerning the country’s current development. The Program’s [...]

Call for Proposals within Standard Grants—EaP: Study Tour of Belarusian and Ukrainian Journalists in the Visegrad Group Countries The International Visegrad Fund (IVF) and the International Renaissance Foundation (IRF) are hereby announcing a call for proposals in compliance with the Standard Grants—EaP program (grant program within the Visegrad 4 Eastern Partnership program). Proposed projects should outline a joint [...]

The Delegation offers two opportunities a year for interns to be recruited for a minimum period of five months up to a maximum of six months. These periods are normally in January and July. In exceptional cases, an internship can be undertaken at a different time of year to that mentioned above or for a [...]

Students can now apply for the Erasmus Mundus IMRCEES scholarships. University of Glasgow –  International Masters in Russian, Central & East European Studies (IMRCEES): We expect to be able to award up to 9 Category A and 7 Category B student scholarships. Additional Erasmus Mundus scholarships will also be available to students from the following External Cooperation Windows [...]

We are glad to invite you to participate in the Eastern Europe Initiatives Congress (EEIC), which will take place between September 11th and 13th, 2012 in Lublin, Poland. It is the very first undertaking of the Centre for Eastern Competences – a think-tank, which was brought into existence by virtue of triangular letter of intent [...]

We are pleased to announce that the Internet Freedom team at Freedom House is now accepting applications for the FH IGF Incubator Project! This exciting competition among civil society activists and organizations will result in funding up to $15,000 USD for projects that promote, protect and advocate for Internet freedom at the national or regional level.  Freedom House IGF Incubator Project [...]

NGOmap Contest for best local initiatives from the Eastern Partnership’s countries is a project that we have worked on since the end of 2010. Our initial aim was to gather information on opportunities for those involved in the third sector’s activities in Eastern Europe.After numerous discussions and consultations, we chose an Internet map as the [...]

“IDP Children” is Magdalena Jańczuk’s photo reportage, presenting the sad reality of Georgian villages and small settlements inhabited by people who had to flee from regions ravaged by war (IDP: internally displaced person). Author: Magdalena Jańczuk

FEMEN activists have published a new documentary “Fight Till The End” about current actions of the group. This time we have a chance to follow, besides the very protests, the whole preparation process. In the lead we see Oksana Shachko who is in charge of the artistic side of FEMEN’s happenings.

EurasiaNet.org: Many ethnic Armenians are disgruntled after fleeing the embattled Syrian city of Aleppo for the safety of Armenia. They say they have been left to fend for themselves in the country they view as their ethnic homeland. Armenian government officials, meanwhile, insist they are doing what they can to accommodate diaspora members. Roughly 100,000 ethnic [...]

The elections held in the self-declared Nagorno- Karabakh Republic that took place on 19 July stirred considerable controversy outside, but in the territory itself they were welcomed by both winners and losers as an example of the determination of the voters to establish democratic rule. There were 98,909 voters eligible to vote, according to the [...]

Viorel Ursu (Open Society Institute–Brussels): The European Union uses positive conditionality—rewarding countries for adopting specific reforms—as a tool to promote open society values. The case of Moldova shows how clearly defined benchmarks and tangible reward enables the EU to push governments to adopt valuable reforms. President Van Rompuy and Nicolae Timofti, president of the Republic [...]

Youth Peace Camp (5-10 September 2012, Georgia): The youth peace camp “Together towards Peace” is aimed at creation of open space for cooperation and confidence building between Turkish, Armenian and Kurdish youth from Turkey, Iraq, Georgia and Armenia. The project “Together towards Peace” is a project of Union of Kurdish Youth of Georgia which is supported [...]