A South Korean non-governmental organization said Monday that it will launch a youth team in Ukraine this week to step up promotion of South Korea and its policy and culture in the European region. The digital public diplomacy team will be comprised of 100 local and Korean students. Its launch ceremony will be held at a university in Kiev, Ukraine on Friday, according to the Voluntary Agency Network of Korea.

Missoula has a head start. Thanks in large part to the initiative of several young mothers who started an organization called Soft Landing, the International Rescue Committee (IRC) is re-establishing an office in Missoula that will serve up to 100 incoming refugees from Syria and elsewhere in the year ahead. The IRC is an officially sanctioned Voluntary Agency (VOLAG) under U.S. refugee policy. 

According to Parni, civic diplomacy involves “people to people” contact through all means, involving social media and conventional media ( press diplomacy ) with particular emphases on social ( humanitarian ) and concrete cultural activities.

In an interview to IANS, Zhao Qizheng, Vice-Chairman of Foreign Affairs of Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), said Chinese businessmen were “not clear” about rules and business environment in India. [...] Zhao maintained that “public diplomacy” could help both sides understand the issues related to doing business in each other’s countries.

The NGO campaigns, led by Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, are vital in this process.  The problem is that journalists, academics, diplomats, political leaders, and Western officials frequently quote these usually uncorroborated accusations in condemning Israeli policies, “reflecting the ‘soft power’ of these NGOs acting to reinforce the Palestinian narrative and the objectives of the OIC.”

Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS)  has quietly been trying to change the odds against Syria’s future generations through its educational programs, some which continue in Syria despite the conflict. [...] Through its Mercy in Motion campaign, sign of its commitment to the Jubilee Year of Mercy, JRS has pledged to increase its educational services to reach 100,000 more of the world’s refugees by the year 2020.

Civil society converged on United Nations Headquarters in New York today to make their voices heard regarding the future global development agenda that will point the way forward on a range of issues such as eradicating poverty, eliminating hunger and combating disease.

The event is part of a project, ID100, bringing together key academics, think tanks, NGOs, international bodies and the general public to address the world’s biggest environmental, political and socioeconomic problems. The project is being led by researchers from the University’s Sheffield Institute for International Development (SIID).