Welcome to Croatia! Croatian youth organisations are already active in Europe

Brussels, 1 July 2013 // Today we mark a historic moment when the Republic of Croatia is becoming the 28th Member State of the European Union (EU). The European Youth Forum very much welcomes the decision of Croatia to join the EU, and would like to recall that the Croatian youth and its youth organisations have been playing an active part in European youth work for over a decade.

From today, Croatia has joined the EU and the European Youth Forum wants to join the celebrations. The Forum believes this is an important signal to the rest of the Western Balkans and other EU candidate states that hard work, respect for rule of law and a more realistic set of expectations can pave way to future EU enlargements. The Youth Forum firmly believes the doors of the EU must remain open to all European countries willing and ready to join.

At the same time the Youth Forum wants to recall that the Croatian youth and its youth organisations gathered in the Croatian Youth Network (MMH) have been playing an active part in European youth work for over a decade. MMH joined our ranks as observer member in 2008 and became full member in 2011. Together we have been striving to cater for the needs of young people and fight for their youth rights.

Marko Boko, President of the Croatian Youth Network stated that "Active citizenship, participation in decision making and accountable policy making are the virtues needed for a healthy democracy and these need to be worked on all the time everywhere not just prior to the entrance in the EU".

As of today Croatia has the third highest youth unemployment rate in the EU with over 40% which makes the need to focus on young people via the implementation of a proper youth guarantee, quality internships and apprenticeship as well as raise awareness about and promote youth entrepreneurship more pertinent. Croatia needs to build on its administrative capacity to be able to absorb the European funds available and should work with representative and youth-led organisations to give the Croatian youth a chance to benefit fully from the opportunities the EU has to offer.

"The Croatian Government together with its EU counterparts needs to start investing properly in youth and include them in all decision-making and policy-making processes that affect young people. They have started implementing the structured dialogue with youth and plan to set up a youth guarantee scheme which is to be welcomed. However, there needs to be real commitment and not just lip-service, young Croatians deserve nothing less", stressed Peter Matjašič, President of the European Youth Forum.

The work done so far in the accession process must be continued to secure the progress made and to translate the enthusiasm of today's celebrations into the long-term commitment to work together to improve the lives of all Croatian citizens and motivate them to contribute to the further development of the European project.