Residence for Climate activist in Kyrgyzstan
Central Asia Solidarity Groups (Centralasiengrupperna) is co-organizing an activist residency in Kyrgyzstan, together with the youth organization Novi Ritm. The residence will take place during 2 weeks in November, primarily based in the southern city of Osh with Novi Ritm as the hosting organization. We are currently looking for suitable candidates for this residence. During the residence the activist will work closely with Novi Ritm and conduct a series of activities, including lectures, workshops, planning sessions and meetings. As Novi Ritm and its young members and volunteers are rather new to the thematic areas of environment and climate,...
Interview with an activist from Uzbekistan
Photo caption: Freedom to all immediatly Let us welcome Lola to a board of active youth in Central Asia! Lola has been selected as one of the participants of the summer residency arranged by CAG a month ago. Regrettably, Lola was not able to come to Sweden, because of issues with her visa. Nevertheless, we are in touch with Lola and discuss ways of potential collaborations in the future. Lola was born and raised in one of the remote areas of Uzbekistan (more about Uzbekistan: https://centralasien.org/en/uzbekistan-en/). Her family is not big. She has a little niece, who she likes...
Positive changes through social coffee shop in Osh
“Social coffee shop brings positive social changes among the youth of Osh” Our dear friends, We are here today to share some updates from our partner organization in Osh, Kyrgyzstan – Novi Ritm. Lately, Novi Ritm has been expanding and building opportunities for youth of the country to speak up about the challenges in the society of Kyrgyzstan. And today we are going to talk about a specific core area of the organization – social entrepreneurship. It is a new working area for Novi Ritm, but they already created the first social coffee shop in Osh! This blogpost will...
Youth workers from Kyrgyzstan and Poland visit Malmö
“Youth Agents for Change – Combating Discrimination Based on Gender Age and Ethnicity” Mobility of youth workers in Malmö, Sweden Dear folks, how did you spend your last few days? For us, these were very intensive and at the same time productive days. CAG together with our partner organizations in Kyrgyzstan – Noviy Ritm and in Poland – KobieTY had a week (May 20-May 26, 2019) of the mobility of youth workers together with civil society organizations working with youth in Sweden. Participants of the program during an introductory session (Day 1)...
Central Asia Days 2018
On November 25th and 26th Centralasiengrupperna is hosting the fifth annual Central Asia Days conference in Stockholm! This two-event will include seminars, lectures, discussions, and a movie screening, with activists, civil society members and researchers. Free admission. Sign up here: https://simplesignup.se/event/141000 Full program: November 25, 12.00 – 19.15 ABF Huset (Per-Albin room), Sveavägen 41, Stockholm 12.00 – 12.30 Reception 12.30 – 14.00 Lecture: Gender Equality: Soviet vs Independent Kyrgyzstan The lecture will be held by Aisuluu Namasbek kyzy from the American University of Central Asia, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. The lecturer will focus on comparison of gender equality in soviet and post-soviet Kyrgyzstan. Kyrgyzstan experienced...
Flashback on the Summer Camp 2018
It’s been almost two and a half months since the third part of the joint project “Strengthening Capacity and Skills among Youth Migrants” between Centralasiengrupperna and Children of St. Petersburg was held in Malmö. It was the final part of the project, which was based on the outcomes of previous events, such as mobility of youth workers in December, that consisted of such events as study visits to organisations that work kids, youth and their families with migrational background; and another mobility of youth workers that took place in April in St. Petersburg, where five trainers from Dotterbolaget and...
Central Asia and the Myth of Radicalization
Central Asia, Uzbekistan in particular, has been widely discussed in Sweden because of the terrorist attack in Stockholm on April 7th, 2017. Since then, the major news outlets in Sweden such as Aftonbladet, Dagens Nyheter, Svenska Dagbladet have linked terrorism to Uzbekistan and generally Central Asia. In other words, it is said that the regime creates grounds for radical extremism. The analysis of how the Swedish mass media constructs Central Asia infers that the region is prone to widespread radicalization, terrorist activities, and fundamentalism. But is this really the case? Do the regimes in Central Asia create grounds for...
LGBT activist is charged for organising peaceful photo session in Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan: Zhanar Sekerbaeva, prominent LGBT activist from Kazakhstan and co-founder of feminist initiative Feminita, based in Almaty, was detained on Wednesday, August 14, 2018. According to Feminita, Zhanar, together with Elena Ivanova, Alina Nevidimko and Polina Pollinium, organized photo session at Arbat street in Almaty on August 9th, 2018, dedicated to de-stigmatization of menstruation that attracted a lot of attention both online and during the session itself. Despite that the photo session was peaceful, it was interrupted by men, who pulled out posters in aggressive manner and threatened to take away mobile phone from one of the participant. The...
Encouraging youth’s civic activism related to human rights in villages and smaller cities in Southern Kyrgyzstan
This summer, Central Asia Solidarity Group’s main partner organization Novi Ritm organized not one but two subsequent Human Rights Camp in Osh, Kyrgyzstan! Novi Ritm is a youth organization run by youth for youth, working with informal education about human rights, gender equality and conflict prevention, most of the time using peer-to-peer methods. The camps were held within the framework of a common project Novi Ritm and Central Asia Solidarity Groups has for 2018-2019. It aims at increasing the knowledge and awareness about human rights among youth in Southern Kyrgyzstan on both a social and legislative level, and strengthening...
Being an intern in Kazakhstan
Hello everyone! I am now back in Sweden and have just started to write my master thesis in strategic communication at Lund University. I had a wonderful time in Kazakhstan and will in this blogpost sum up my experiences from living and working as an intern for UNICEF in Astana, Kazakhstan and traveling around Central Asia. UNICEF’s work in Kazakhstan is mainly focused on health, education, child protection and social inclusion. They work with the Government and national and international partners to ensure the rights of all children enshrined in the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC)....