On the project

On 1 January 2008 the Visa Facilitation Agreement (VFA) came into force for citizens of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia with the aim to enable easier Schengen visa procedures for travelling to the EU.

"Tuzla is on the road to become a centre to which people come, rather than a province that people leave" 

With the Mayor of Tuzla, Jasmin Imamović, we talked about creating an atmosphere of coexistence and tolerance, about what it means for a city to endorse a policy of openness. In addition, the Mayor spoke of the previous results of the development and the future vision for the city of Tuzla.

Interviewer: Adis Jašarević

In the framework of the project "The media in the process of reintegration and sustainable return", a public advocacy campaign has been initiated for reducing xenophobic elements and discrimination in the areas of minority return. The public advocacy campaign, through which we wish to reduce xenophobic elements, will have a sensible approach and will acknowledge the political dimension of the problem.

In the framework of the project "Gender sensitive budgeting", a publication Suggestions and guidelines for gender sensitive budgeting in Bosnia and Herzegovina has been issued. After completing the analyses of the municipalities' budgets, the teams of analysts prepared a report consisting of the analysis of basic categories of the public expenditure on the local levels and delivered it to Association Vesta, which has, with the help of the gender mechanism in Bosnia and Herzegovina, prepared and printed the publication.

The media in the process of sustainable return and reintegration was the topic of the Conference held in Tuzla on June 18^th, 2008. The Conference was the result of years-long attempts of Association Vesta to instill the necessary level of sensitization into the local media which is typical of the global non-profit media, which respond to the community's needs and promote its progress.

Last week, as part of the "Visa facilitation" project, the "Visa hotline" telephone line was launched. Citizens from five West Balkan countries (Macedonia, Montenegro, Albania, Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina) have the opportunity to share their experience in the process of obtaining a visa, to state their opinions and ask about their rights in the framework of the new visa facilitation agreement, which came into force on January 1^st, 2008.

Visa hotline is being set up on June 10th 2008 simultaneuosly in 5 countries from Western Balkans (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Serbia, Macedonia and Albania). For the first time civil society organizations from the five countries from Western Balkans are holding a joint action in order to assess the impacts of the visa facilitation agreements and to campaign for a visa free regime.