This month, President Obama is in Africa reaching out to the approximately 200 million people on the continent between the ages of 15 and 24. The United States is strengthening ties with this dynamic and fast-growing region, embracing what the President has described as “a new era of engagement, based on mutual interests and mutual respect…to advance the common security and prosperity of all people.”

It is necessary to protect the ongoing people-to-people cooperation from becoming yet another bargaining chip in the game of sanctions and counter-sanctions. To the extent possible, the people-to-people dimension of the EU-Russia relations should be insulated from the negative developments in security, political and economic dimensions.

It clarifies Cuba in America's official narrative not as a security threat but a country in transition, which is more in line both with Cuba's own self-image and how Latin American and European countries see it. Such a description undermines any rationality for the embargo and lends itself to a U.S. policy that emphasizes engagement and people to people contacts.

China called for closer people-to-people bond when implementing the Belt and Road Initiative, in a bid to win public support for deepening bilateral and multinational cooperation.

The Indonesian government has awarded the Art and Cultural Scholarship to 70 participants from 40 countries to enhance people-to-people contact between Indonesia and the international community.