“During challenging times like these, there’s no replacement for people-to-people diplomacy – it’s something governments just can’t do,” observes Joanne Bouldt Sanders, former mayor of Sonoma and co-Chairman of Sonoma Sister City International. [...] “Organizations like Sister Cities International connect communities around the world, bringing people from different cultures together, allowing them to understand each other better and develop and build positive relationships"

In 2016 YFU announced the creation of a Virtual Exchange Initiative to expand on its mission to advance intercultural understanding, mutual respect, and social responsibility through educational exchanges for youth, families, and communities.The pilot program encourages online open dialogue among teenagers in the US and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). 

In a few weeks, 14 members of the Felix Mantilla Little League will board a plane that will cross an ocean and land in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Most of the kids, ages 9 and 10, have never been out of Milwaukee. In Puerto Rico, they will play baseball games against age-group peers. [...] But baseball is not the most important part of the trip. The kids, mostly from low-income families, will visit historic Old San Juan, the Arecibo Observatory and the El Yunque rainforest and will tour the Puerto Rico Sports Hall of Fame.

Through the program, she met a Burmese cook and refugee named Zin Zin, and the two women teamed up to teach classes about nutrition and "the unique challenges of eating healthy in the U.S.," a new country where much of the food available is unfamiliar to refugees from Southeast Asia, Somalia and other strife-torn regions of the world. Funds through grants were extremely limited, though, so Toscano created Fooition as a way to raise money to help continue her mission.

The Public Diplomacy program aims to combat the BDS movement and the delegitimization of Israel through uniting a global community of pro-Israel activists on social media in a coordinated effort to inform and influence people on Israel.

From New York to Yokohama, an unstoppable wave of yellow monsters is infiltrating public venues, performing strange rituals and targeting young humans. Having already dominated Japan and conquered a number of overseas markets, the “Pocket Monsters” video game series, now in its 20th year, is entering a new realm: reality.

Cuban ambassador Carlos Fernández de Cossío has for the first time attended the 4th of July celebrations by the United States embassy in Pretoria. De Cossio even had a private meeting with US ambassador Patrick Gaspard on the sidelines of the celebrations at his official home on Thursday. The Miami theme included the serving of Cuban food and a performance by an Afro-Cuban band.