Outstanding antennae organising outstanding events – just a couple of weeks ago, AEGEE-Yerevan organised the Armenia Model European Union (AMEU) for the fourth year in a row! Armenia is one of the countries from the Eastern Partnership (EaP) that aims to strengthen the cooperation with the EU within the next few years, so organising a MEU, with more than 140 members coming from several countries from Europe and beyond, and making it a ‘tradition’ for the past four years is considered a huge achievement and a “cornerstone” for the EU-Armenia relations. The AEGEEan interviewed Armenak Minasyants, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of AEGEE-Yerevan and one of the people behind the AMEU’s success.

Armenak Minasyants

The AEGEEan: Armenak, the first AMEU was launched back in 2011. Do you remember how the idea of organizing it came up?
Armenak Minasyants: Yes, of course I remember it! It was one of the craziest days in my life. Actually, back in August 2011, me and Julia Beglaryan (the Co-Founder of MEU in Armenia) were having our usual Saturday coffee meeting and after surfing on Facebook for several minutes, we noticed that there would be simulation conferences organized by the UN and OSCE offices in Armenia, which would simulate the activities of these international organizations. Being members of AEGEE, we automatically had a question: why do we still not have a Model EU Conference in Armenia? The answer was even faster: if we do not have it – LET’S ORGANIZE! Thanks to the Delegation of the European Union to Armenia our initiative got full administrative, financial and institutional support from the European Commission, thus allowing us to establish a project, which has already existed for four years and has proved its full sustainability!

This year is already the fourth edition. Which lessons did you learn from the past ones?
The patience, hard work and dedication are keys for success. If you focus more on the organizational matters rather than on the self-promotion you are always able to succeed and achieve any goal, no matter how non-realistic and ambitious it may look like in the beginning. At least this was the lesson I and my team have learned from the past years.

Which were the topics covered in this year’s MEU?
The suggested topic of AMEU2014 was the “EU Common Foreign and Security Policy in Light of the Ukrainian Crisis”. In our belief each conference should have a message inside, and our message was clear: peace and security are cornerstones to develop a democratic society and sustainable democracy on the European continent. During the activities of AMEU2014 itself, the participants had three plenary sittings, discussed the ongoing political situation in Ukraine, debated about the NATO Wales Summit 2014 and adopted a resolution in regard of the pressure exercised by the Russian government on the Eastern Partnership countries and in particular destabilization of Eastern Ukraine.

The participants also took part in the high level panel discussion titled “Where does the EU EaP Programme Lead to?”, with the participation of the Head of the EU Delegation to Armenia H.E. Mr. Traian Hristea, representatives of the Armenian civil society and the Youth Advisory Council of the Council of Europe.

How many participants did you have? Were there also participants coming from other countries?
This edition was a very special one, as first of all it was the biggest thematic political simulation conference ever organized in Armenia, gathering 140 young people from 16 different countries in Yerevan. The countries geography was huge: from Spain to Kazakhstan. I think this multicultural segment of the project is the most important one, as it allows first of all the local Armenian participants to get to know their future colleagues, as well as to experience something truly European.

You have also cooperated with the EU Delegation to Armenia. Do you think that organizing events such as MEU are meaningful for Armenia’s relations with the EU?
I consider this type of events to be the cornerstone of Armenia-EU relations, as they allow firstly the Armenian young people to get better understanding about the European Union and how its policies impact our country. Whenever we talk about the European integration process of any non-EU member states, it is vital to have a high level of political integration matched with the required level of civic integration.

And talking about it – can you tell us a bit about the current status of these relations (Armenia-EU), and what is expected in the next few years?
Well, one of the foreign policy priorities of Armenia is the integration with the European family, on the basis of the commitments and common values, undertaken within the framework of cooperation with the European Union. In July 2013, Armenia and the EU successfully finalized talks over the Association Agreement and the Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement, which however were not signed due to Armenia’s decision to join the Russian-led and newly formed Eurasian Economic Union. It is worth to mention that in Armenia this decision is mostly considered to be an exclusively economic decision, which also means that Armenia remains totally open to develop and accordingly sign with the European Union the political segment of the Association Agreement.

Currently, after one year of stalemate caused both with the formation of the new European Commission as well as with the finalization of Armenia’s access to the Eurasian Economic Union, it seems that the Armenian and European sides are getting back to talk. Now it is very important to understand what type of cooperation we would have. I personally think and hope that very soon we would have much more material information in this regard and hopefully by the EU-EaP Riga Summit 2015 the sides would agree over a new legal framework of cooperation. I would also like to emphasize the role of the new Erasmus+ programme, which opens up a huge window of opportunities for the Armenian students.

Last but not least – what about AEGEE-Yerevan? How many members does it have, and which activities do you usually organize?
Well, AEGEE-Yerevan is definitely blossoming now! Currently there are around 50 members registered and more than half of them are directly involved in the everyday activities of the organization. We of course organize classical AEGEE events (SUs, LTCs and etc.), but what is much more important is that we are regularly implementing the EU funded local short and long term programs, mostly tackling civic education and youth mobility, which are also included as Focus Areas in the Strategic Plan of AEGEE-Europe for 2014-2017. Accordingly, this leads also to a higher level of professionalism of our board and members. I do not want to say that we perceive AEGEE in a different way, but we are trying to be very professional with any event and hopefully the future boards would keep this good tradition.

Which are the future plans for the antenna?
We always aim as high as it is possible! AEGEE-Yerevan really wants to host one of the upcoming Network Meetings in 2015, and why not? We also want to bring one of the statutory events to Yerevan in the future! At least we surely have both the human resources and professional capacity to make this happen.

Written by Anna Gumbau, AEGEE-Barcelona

AEGEE Mainz-Wiesbaden will organize a Model European Union Simulation event this summer and it is already possible to apply. For this reason, The AEGEEan took the opportunity to interview Rene Schroeder from AEGEE-Mainz-Wiesbaden about the antenna and the event itself.

The AEGEEan: Can you tell us a bit more about your antenna? When were you founded? How many members do you have? Are you very active?

Rene Schroeder: AEGEE Mainz-Wiesbaden was founded in January 1970 and currently has 21 members. The new board was installed on January 22, 2014. The newly elected president is Ms. Alicia Clesius, together with her secretaries Christina Bingler and Katharina Bunde. Furthermore, there have been chosen four more persons into the board, with Hannes Frank being the connector between AEGEE and the ERASMUS Team, René Schröder having the focus in and around the Model European Union (MEU) simulation and Robert Pieszczyk and Cynthia Kraus having further assignments. At the beginning of every semester, we encourage fellow students to join the AEGEE experience. The members visit lectures all around the campus, give information about AEGEE and invite them to the weekly meetings. As the old board left in January, we try to uphold the new spirit and try to install as many new members as possible in order to secure the future existence of AEGEE Mainz-Wiesbaden. We just got in contact with AEGEE-Praha and AEGEE-Enschede about some cultural exchanges during this year’s spring and/or summer. We will also send one or two board members to Spring Agora Patra 2014 and take part in as many events as possible.

How are you trying to get members now that it is Summer University Application period?

We already had a booth on the campus this year to announce the summer universities and might continue with that in the upcoming semester as well. We will talk to all the interested students about their opportunities and give them as much information as they need.

What made you interested in hosting the Model European Union?

MEU Mainz is a great opportunity to meet people from all over Europe and even beyond that. It is a lot of fun to interact with them, talk about different topics and make them feel good. And as a student’s organization it was almost a duty as we initiated the MEU Mainz in 2011 with the cooperation of Bringing Europeans Together Association (BETA) eV. 

What are your tasks in organizing the event?

There are various tasks for us to make the event happen: the organization of sleeping facilities and finding a room for the simulation itself are the most important points. Then there is the work of team coordination, as we are with nearly 35 people organizing the event this year. The Delegate Generals (DGs) of this years team are David Degenhardt and Lukas Prinz. The team is split up in several resources, as Public Relations, Fundraising, Content, Participants Coordination, Social Program and Logistics. All of these teams do a marvelous job, offering a lot of their free time into the organization every year.

Why should you apply for MEUM 2014?

Rather simple to answer: if you are interested in European politics and have ever wanted to be a member of the European Council, a member of the Parliament of the EU or a journalist, this is your chance! The topics are always up-to-date and are real topics that are discussed in the Parliament and Council in Strasbourg too. Additionally, you have the opportunity of getting to know the city of Mainz and inspire yourself with some traditional habits, like food, wine and more.  Personally, I haven’t attended a MEU and most of our organizational staff of the newer generation (since 2012) hasn’t as well. But we always get input from our predecessors and friends who give advice and help us to make the event both bigger and better.

How is the organization like of the MEU?

The organization of events like the MEU is always a success, considering the opinion of the participants who always give feedback on the event. Moreover, the organization itself is a bless, because we have a really good crew that always stands together like a union and many friendships have already arisen from this, too.

Do you consider it a challenge that the event is around the same time as the SUs?

No, it is not a challenge, since the MEUM has its own organizing staff, creates all the advertisements and the antenna mostly deals with events like the SU, which is advertised by the antenna itself, far apart from the MEU. AEGEE, moreover, mainly serves as the arranging partner for the MEU, which has its own body and can therefore serve as an own organiszation, like the ERASMUS team.

Written by Patricia Anthony, AEGEE-Zaragoza

In AEGEE-Kraków, International Politics Working Group (IPWG) is not as popular as Public Relations Committee (PRC) or Human Resources Committee (HRC) but May will belong to them! Model of United Nations in Kraków is a project created and organized by IPWG in AEGEE-Kraków and is open for young people from over the world.

The era of wars, conflicts and misunderstandings seems to be averted and the world is developing based on agreements. However we do not know how it will be in the future. We need to make sure that the younger generations will be able to keep the peace. To achieve this, young people need to know how certain organisations work – what the work of a diplomat looks like, what qualities s/he must have in order to perform their function well. Although the job of a diplomat is a tough nut to crack, more and more young people want to educate themselves and broaden their horizons, to have an impact on the fate of the world.

The question is: how to gain valuable experience before entering the political arena?

IPWG members decided to take care of their own development and not wait until someone gives them a chance to train in the field of international politics. In May there will be an event about AEGEE Model of United Nations in Kraków. This is an international conference organised by the IPWG of AEGEE-Kraków in partnership with the United Nations Youth Associations (UNYA Poland) and the Oriental Academic Society of Jagiellonian University.

The participants, students from Poland and abroad, will play the role of delegates of UN Member States generating a common approach on the major issues of international politics. The project will consist of two simulations of United Nations meetings: one on the conflict in Mali and one on the issue of North African refugees’ rights in Europe. The conference aims to spread and share knowledge on problems of the modern world and UN’s role in solving them, and gives participants the opportunity to develop their diplomatic skills.

As delegates of the Security Council Member States or Observer States, they will do their best to defend the position of the state they will be representing. All the participants will follow the official procedure and chosen methods of negotiation in order to create together a resolution compatible with the ideas of human rights and peaceful conflict resolution and at the same time coinciding with the particular national interests of the state concerned.

As you can see, people who meet each other in a small working group can create a project that will affect the development of young diplomat’s careers. Apart from the UN meeting simulation itself, on the first day of the conference the participants will also attend a workshop during which rules of procedure will be presented, as well as some tips for a successful conference.

Written by Karolina Kubala, AEGEE-Kraków 

He has been active in AEGEE for many years, managed successful projects and experienced duties in different levels of AEGEE. His ambition for experiencing and exploring seem to not fade away as we saw the announcement that Perçin İmrek (AEGEE-Cannakale) was selected as chair person for Model European Union 2013 in Strasbourg.

AEGEEan: Could you share with us what you have been doing in recent months and a little about your military service for our readers?

Now I am back in Turkey, preparing for my military service that will start December 12th 2012. This month I am in Canakkale, the city where I studied. I am mostly busy meeting my old professors, doing lots of sports and planning my future after the military.

About my military service, I am obliged to do it as a Turkish citizen, where I will most probably be recruited as a private between the months December 2012 to May 2013. It is not that long, but it is still a hunch I need to get rid of. There is also a chance that I will be recruited as a Lieuitenant, but that would mean I will do my service for 11 months. The only good thing about being a Lieuitenant is that I would get paid. But I would much rather choose the short term service. I still think it will be an interesting experience.

Why did you decide to apply for the position of the chair person at Model European Union (MEU) 2013 in the first place?

As you know, I have previous chairing experience in AEGEE, working as the chair person. It is something that I believe I am good at, and I enjoy doing. So I wanted to take it to the next level. This is also something that I would aspire to do professionally in the future (ex: chairing the meetings of the United Nations). Therefore, I believed that the MEU is the perfect place for me to show my skills and get more experience. MEU is an important platform where young professionals work and one can prove himself there.

Perçin with AEGEE-İstanbul members

Can you tell us about Model European Union? How was your previous experience about the event and what are your expectations for the next one?

Model European Union, as you can understand from its name, is an event where young people simulate the sessions in the European Parliament and the Council on a certain topic. There is a made-up topic (when we had the simulation in the college last year, the topic was airport slot allocations) where the exact procedure of the co-decision system in the European Union is being simulated both on the Parliament and the Council level. The participants are divided into MEP’s and Ministers, where they discuss and vote on those topics. The chairperson (either the Parliament or the Council) is responsible for chairing these meetings, managing them on time and keeping a flowing and constructive discussion going on.

My previous experience in MEU is none, so to say. This is because I have never attended an MEU before (I know its bizarre, since most of the chairs are former MEU participants or organisers). But I have simulation experience from my simulation class in the College of Europe last year, where I acted as a Polish MEP from S&D (Social Democrats). And as I told before, I have chairing experience in AEGEE as the chairperson.

How do you see the event in general? As I was trying to gather more knowledge about MEU, I realised the website is not so well updated and some informtation is missing. Are you thinking of doing something about this and make MEU more known?

I know the event proves to be a success every year. I confirm these rumours by the testimony of my friends who attended the MEU in the previous years.

About the website, I can not help you much there, since it is the task of the organisers. They have asked for our info and photos to put on the website, so I can only imagine that it is on process and all the info will be there soon.

How you see your preparation for Model European Union 2013? 

I already have a broad knowledge on how the European institutions work (especially the European Parliament, which I will be chairing). Therefore, I will just refresh my knowledge on it, prepare on the topic, learn all the rules by heart and use my previous experience. With the combination of all these, I think everything will go smoothly.

You  are experienced in being a chair person for AEGEE’s statutory events, though the content is not the same as MEU. Could you tell what kind of challenges you are expecting?

Since I have never been in an MEU, I cannot compare. But I was in the selection training for the MEU in Berlin, where we held a little simulation. I have seen some differences with AEGEE there.

First of all, the MEU participants have a much better level of English. In AEGEE we have a lot of people who speak very good English, but we also have a lot who do not. In the MEU, all the participants are above a certain level of English. Apart from that, the MEU participants have a very broad knowledge on European topics, while AEGEE is much more heterogeneous than that.

I have seen that in AEGEE I have learned to be more interventionist (or maybe that is because of my character), which means I do not hesitate to intervene when I deem necessary. I have seen that the other MEU chair candidates did not do that. Maybe that’s what got me selected after all.

Therefore, it is certain that AEGEE and MEU are two different worlds. But I have been in an environment similar to MEU before in, as I said, the College of Europe.

Perçin with the chair team in EBM Riga

What are your future plans after the military service especially?

I have a few paths which I drew, and I will sure follow one of them after my military service.

First of all, I will be in Nairobi, Kenya in the summer, working in an organisation that helps children to go to school. I will help with their fundraising activities, plus I will be an English teacher in the public schools.

After that, I will enter the concurrence (selection process) for the ministry of Foreign Affairs in Turkey.

I will also apply for the European Commission and the European Parliament as an intern.

I will apply for a Phd scholarship that is funded by the European Commission, where I can do my Phd in Rome and one year in Boston.

Another plan is that I would like to open a Language School and an Academy in Canakkale, Turkey. I will of course not do all of these, but most probably one of these plans will happen.

Is there anything you want to tell the ones who might want to go for this position in the future,what steps they will need to take and how experienced they should be?

Apart from the typical cliche words (Be disciplined, never give up, take every failure as a lesson, do not listen to everything that people say, trust yourself etc…), I can tell them that they should do what makes them happy. And if they think being the chairperson in the MEU is what makes them happy and that can bring them a step forward in life, there is no reason not to be. If I managed it, anyone can, because there is no difference between me or any other person.

Thank you for your time Percin! The AEGEEan wishes you good luck with your plans! 

Written by Deniz Özhan, AEGEE-Eskişehir